.NRLF 


Bfn. 


ft 


THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT 
IN  PLAUTUS 


CAMBRIDGE   UNIVERSITY   PRESS 
C.  F.  CLAY,  Manager 


LONDON 
Fetter  Lane,  E.C.  4 


EDINBURGH 
100  Princes  Street 


NEW  YORK :  G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 

BOMBAY,  CALCUTTA,  MADRAS:  MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  Ltd. 

TORONTO :  J.  M.  DENT  AND  SONS,  Ltd. 

TOKYO:  THE  MARUZEN-KAEUSHIKI-KAISHA 


All  rights  reserved 


THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT 
IN   PLAUTUS 


BY 

K.  M.  WESTAWAY,  M.A. 


Cambridge: 

at  the   University   Press 

1917 


Quasi  poeta,  tabulas  quom  cepit  sibi, 

quaerit  quod  nusquam  gentiumst,  reperit  tamen, 

facit  illud  ueri  simile  quod  mendacium  est, 

nunc  ego  poeta  fiam. 

PseudoluSf  401-404. 


CONTENTS 


INTRODUCTION:  The  Problem 


PAGE 

vi 


CHAPTER   I 
REMARKS   ON   INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS 

1.  The  Mercator:  the  pkoblem  of  literal  translation. 

2.  The   Poenulus  and    the   Miles   Gloriosus:    contami- 

NATIO 

3.  The  Rudens:   the  introduction  of  romance 

4.  The  Pseudolus  and  the  Trucule.xtus:  Plautus'  ideal 

5.  The  Amphitruo:   the  gift  of  Euripides 


1 

1 

4 

8 
11 


CHAPTER   II 

THE  ORIGINAL   ELEMENT     .......  16 

1.  Historical  ali.usions 16 

2.  IxOMAN  geography 20 

(a)     Rome 20 

(6)     Italy 22 

(c)     The  rest  of  the  Roman  world      ....  24 

3.  Military  life 26 

4.  Politics  and  legal  customs 32 

5.  Social  life 37 

6.  Religion ^^ 

7.  Money,  etc 68 

8.  Unclassified  examples 69 

9.  Language '" 


CHAPTER   III 
CONCLUSION:    ''THE   HACK'S   PROGRESS" 


76 


a3 


383838 


INTRODUCTION 


THE  PROBLEM 


"I  wish,"  said  the  teacher  to  the  student,  "that  you 
were  working  at  an  artist,  and  not  at  a  hack  like  Plautus." 

The  student,  puzzled  and  discouraged,  consulted  other 
authorities  as  to  the  precise  meaning  of  "hack,"  and  found 
that  it  meant  "a  literary  drudge,  who  is  much  overworked, 
and  therefore  a  person  habitually  tired." 

Now,  whatever  other  faihngs  may  be  ascribed  to  Plautus, 
he  certainly  never  shows  signs  of  being  tired ;  and  although 
he  is  often  casually  set  down  as  being  nothing  better  than 
a  mechanical  translator  from  Greek  into  Latin,  yet  a  perusal 
of  his  plays  suggests  that  many  of  them  are  the  work  neither 
of  a  hack  nor  of  a  single  artist,  but  of  several  artists,  of  whom 
Plautus  was  indubitably  one. 

From  the  vague  generahties  which  are  found  in  treatises 
on  Latin  hterature,  it  would  seem  that  the  plays  of  Plautus 
"  are  in  the  main  versions  or  imitations  of  originals  of  the  New 
Comedy."  Therefore,  in  proportion  to  the  value  which  we 
set  upon  both  the  New  Comedy  and  Plautus,  it  is  profitable 
to  examine  how  the  Roman  poet  treated  the  material  at  his 
command,  and  to  what  extent,  if  at  all,  he  contributed  to  his 
work  something  original,  something  of  his  own  personality. 


INTRODUCTION  Vll 

In  translating  Greek  plays  into  Latin,  two  courses  were 
open  to  him.  He  might  have  remodelled  his  play  in  every 
detail,  changing  the  scenes,  names,  and  general  customs, 
and  adapting  them  to  his  own  age  and  country.  Such  a 
work  would  approximate  to  the  fahula  togata,  the  national 
Roman  comedy.  It  was  a  type  not  common  at  Rome,  by 
reason  of  the  strict  laws  which  forbade  the  exhibition  of 
current  poUtics  or  personalities  on  the  stage.  Nae\dus  tried 
it,  and  paid  the  penalty.  On  the  other  hand,  Plautus  might 
wdth  the  Greek  plot  have  retained  the  Greek  customs,  names, 
and  places,  and  produced  what  were  called  fahulae  palliatae. 
This  is  approximately  what  he  did,  and  the  present  problem 
is  to  ascertain  the  value  of  the  result. 

Chief  among  the  difficulties  in  this  enquiry  is  our  ignorance 
of  the  New  Comedy.  The  four  longest  fragments  of  Menan- 
der,  precious  though  they  are  in  the  circumstances,  are  but 
a  very  small  fraction  of  the  large  literature  which  they  repre- 
sent. They  certainly  read  as  if  they  had  some  kinship  with 
Plautus,  though  much  more  with  the  less  boisterous  Terence, 
but  we  have  no  proof  that  they  are  typical  of  all  that  is  lost. 
Beyond  these,  the  extant  remains  of  the  New  Comedy  are 
the  merest  scraps,  chosen  by  moraUsts  for  a  special  purpose, 
and  the  possibiHty,  always  present,  that  from  the  sands  of 
Egypt  or  some  other  hiding-place  of  literary  treasure,  there 
will  come  to  Hght  some  direct  original  of  a  Plautine  comedy, 
makes  us  hesitate  to  accept  for  a  certainty  even  a  single 
suggestion  concerning  Plautus'  originahty.  Our  knowledge 
of  his  sources  is  derived  from  the  prologues,  and  is  Umited 
to  the  following  hst : 

The  Rudens  from  the  Trrjpa  of  Diphilus. 

The  Oasina  from  the  KXT^povfievoc  of  Diphilus. 


VIU  INTRODUCTION 

The  Mostellaria  from  the  (fydafia  of  Diphilus. 

The  Mercator  from  the  efxiropo^  of  Philemon. 

The  Bacchides  from  the  BU  i^aTrarcov  of  Menander. 

The  Asinaria  from  the  6vay6<;  of  Demophilus. 

The  Miles  Gloriosus  partly  from  the  aXa^wv  of  an  unknown 
author. 

The  Poenulus  partly  from  the  Kapxv^ovio^  of  an  unknown 
author. 

This  leaves  twelve  plays  of  which  we  are  quite  unable  to 
trace  the  originals. 

We  are  further  handicapped  by  our  ignorance  of  Plautus' 
preparation  for  dramatic  work,  and  of  the  conditions  under 
which  he  carried  it  out.  This  makes  it  all  the  more  important 
to  consider  him  (perhaps  more  than  is  usually  done)  in  con- 
junction with  the  historical  events  in  which  he  moved.  We 
know  from  A.  Gellius  that  he  was  born  of  poor  parents  at 
Sarsina  in  Umbria  about  254  B.C. ;  that  he  went  to  Rome,  and 
worked  as  a  stage-carpenter,  or  possibly  as  an  actor;  that 
he  made  some  money,  and  lost  it  later  through  speculations 
in  foreign  trade ;  that  he  then  hired  himself  to  a  miller,  and 
in  his  leisure  time  wrote  plays  and  sold  them;  and  that 
he  died  in  184.  Such  a  Hfe  of  hard  work,  poverty,  and 
misfortune,  could  hardly  have  been  expected  to  yield  a 
Hterature  with  sufficient  vitaUty  to  survive  for  more  than 
two  thousand  years.  As  was  the  case  with  Shakespeare, 
however,  his  work  in  connection  with  the  theatre  must  have 
given  him  an  insight  into  the  technicahties  of  play-producing, 
and  have  enabled  him  to  make  any  necessary  modifications 
of  Greek  plays  for  adaptation  to  the  requirements  of  the 
Roman  stage.  Of  his  education  we  know  nothing,  though 
it  seems  safe  to  assume  that  he  knew  Greek,  while  the  fifth 


iNTRODUCTIOlsr  IX 

act  of  the  Poenulus  suggests  that  he  had  at  least  a  working 
knowledge  of  Carthaginian.  In  later  ages  a  hundred  and 
thirty  plays  passed  under  his  name.  Varro  thought  there 
were  only  twenty-one  certainly  authentic  plays,  and  it  has 
been  suggested  that  the  rismainder  were  other  people's  works 
which  he  merely  touched  up.  Yet  it  is  difficult  to  see  what 
plays  these  can  have  been.  He  had  no  predecessors  bc}  ond 
Andronicus  and  Naevius,  and  there  is  no  evidence  that  their 
plays  underwent  revision  at  his  hands.  In  any  case  he 
seems  to  have  been  a  most  prohfic  writer,  and  the  twenty 
plays  now  extant  do  not  by  any  means  form  the  total  of  his 
output. 

It  is  essential  to  remember  that  he  stands  very  early  in  the 
hne  of  Latin  writers.  In  his  own  country  he  had  singularly 
little  literary  tradition  behind  him.  To  a  degree  which  we  find 
it  hard  to  reconstruct  in  imagination,  he  had  to  be  tentative, 
ingenious,  resourceful,  and  self-dependent.  He  is  actually 
the  most  ancient  of  extant  Latin  authors,  and  as  he  is  in 
this  way,  to  us,  isolated  from  the  few  other  writers  of  his  age, 
we  cannot  fathom  any  of  the  motives,  other  than  mercenary, 
which  turned  his  activity  in  the  direction  of  play-writing, 
nor  can  we  estimate  the  ideals  at  which  he  aimed.  This 
at  least  is  certain,  that  he  did  not  aspire  to  provide  twentieth- 
century  scholars  with  specimens  of  pure  Greek  or  pm'e  Roman 
comedy.  He  recognised  an  immediate  requirement  of  his 
age,  and,  unaware  that  Quintihan  would  have  reason  to 
lament  his  countrymen's  lack  of  aptitude  for  comedy^,  he  met 
this  need  by  a  Hterature  which  retained  unbroken  popularity 
on  the  stage  till  the  time  of  the  actor  Roscius  a  hundred 
years  later.  It  is  unlikely  that  he  anticipated  or  even 
^  in  comoedia  mazime  claiidicamus,  Quintilian. 


X  INTRODUCTION 

desired  literary  immortality.  Of  all  forms  of  literature, 
comedy  is  perhaps  the  least  likely  to  win  permanent  appre- 
ciation. We  shall  try  to  trace  his  growing  recognition  of 
this  fact  as  seen  in  his  treatment  of  the  bygone  Greek  drama ; 
and  probably  if  he  ever  estimated  the  prospective  hfe  of 
his  own  works,  he  took  this  lesson  to  heart.  Certainly  he 
never  supposed  that  anyone  would  enquire  into  his  original 
element,  and,  apart  from  his  untiring  vivacity  and  exuberant 
realism,  his  vivid  imagination  and  power  of  expression,  he 
has,  in  collusion  with  the  sands  of  Egypt  mentioned  above, 
wrapped  his  originaUty  in  an  impenetrable  veil.  Suggestions 
on  the  subject  can  be  nothing  more  than  a  questionable 
hypothesis,  and  by  our  proposed  dissection  of  his  genius 
we  are  treating  unnaturally  one  of  the  most  spontaneous 
writers  of  any  age. 

There  are,  as  well,  minor  difficulties  in  this  problem. 
It  is  useless  to  try  to  separate,  in  a  mechanical  way,  "the 
Greek"  from  "the  Roman"  in  these  plays.  Such  a  process 
is  Hke  a  double-edged  sword,  and  cuts  two  ways.  In  the 
first  place,  Plautus  must  have  translated  many  Greek  tech- 
nical terms,  particularly  in  legal  and  judicial  matters,  and 
to  a  smaller  extent,  in  the  case  of  military  and  certain  social 
formulae,  by  corresponding  Roman  technical  terms.  Thus 
praetor  is  presumably  equivalent  to  ap')(^cov ,  foruni  to  ayopd, 
and  so  on ;  and  although  these  words  have  a  Roman  colour, 
we  cannot  for  that  reason  count  them  as  an  "original 
element"  in  Plautus.  It  is  impossible  to  know  here  where 
to  draw  the  line.  On  the  other  hand,  in  Plautus'  day  there 
must  have  been  a  certain  amount  of  Greek  assimilated  into 
Latin  language  and  thought.  This  will  be  discussed  in 
detail  later  in  the  enquiry,  but  again  it  is  impossible  to  draw 


INTRODUCTION  XI 

a  definite  line  between  the  two  elements.  The  amount  of 
incorporated  Greek  mnst,  for  historical  reasons,  have  been 
small  compared  with  what  it  was  in  later  ages ;  but  that  it 
was  already  well-estabhshed  and  steadily  increasing  is 
suggested  by  the  vigorous  opposition  offered  to  it  in  all  its 
branches  by  Cato,  and  still  more  by  the  fact  that  in  his  later 
days  that  sturdy  old  Roman  was  forced  in  some  degree  to 
acknowledge  its  worth  and  to  seek  personal  advantage 
from  it. 

Our  enquiry  will  be  divided  into  three  parts.  First  we 
shall  consider  the  pecuharities  of  some  individual  plays 
which  seem  to  represent  different  periods  of  Plautus'  maturing 
art.  Secondly,  regarding  the  plays  as  a  whole,  and  remem- 
bering the  Greek  origin  which  is  assumed  as  the  background 
of  them  all,  we  shall  see  to  what  extent  Plautus  has  introduced 
into  them  genuine  elements  of  contemporary  Roman  Hfe 
and  thought,  and  how  far  he  has  ehminated  Grecisms  which 
would  strike  his  audience  as  being  quaint  or  foreign.  Lastly, 
after  this  examination  of  facts  derived  exclusively  from  the 
plays  themselves,  we  shall  be  in  a  position  to  offer  some 
tentative  suggestions  concerning  Plautus'  natural  hterary 
endowment  and  the  development  which  it  underwent  during 
his  long  career. 

Plautus  is  difficult  to  illustrate  by  parallel  quotations, 
and  a  word  is  necessary  concerning  the  value  of  illustrations 
derived  from  other  Latin  authors.  A  parallel  from  Cato, 
for  long  the  staunch  opponent  of  everything  Greek,  may 
reasonably  be  supposed  to  mark  a  Plautine  feature  as 
Roman:  but  later  authors  were  probably  influenced  by 
Greek  ideas  far  more  than  Plautus  was,  and  a  quotation 
from  their  writings  does  not  at  all  necessarily  contribute 


xii  INTRODUCTION 

a  Roman  rather  than  a  Greek  notion.  Nevertheless,  these 
iUustrations,  if  chosen  with  discretion,  may  possess  a  con- 
siderable value,  as  pointing,  at  the  very  lowest  estimate, 
to  Roman  thought  at  a  somewhat  later  period. 

[In  the  following  pages,  references  to  the  text  of  Plautus 
are  in  accordance  with  the  Oxford  text  of  Professor  Lindsay, 
and  those  to  Menander  follow  the  Teubner  edition  of  Koerte 
(1910).] 


CHAPTER  I 

REMARKS  ON  INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS 

1.     The  Mercator:  the  problem  of  literal 
translation 

The  fact  of  translation  should  not,  in  itself,  detract  from 
Plautus'  originality  as  it  would  from  that  of  a  modern  writer. 
Practically  all  Roman  hterature,  down  to  his  day,  was 
translated  Greek.  The  Romans  had  simply  not  reached  the 
stage  of  composing  a  literature  of  their  own.  One  of  the 
chief  reasons  for  this  was  that  so  far  they  had  been  too  busy 
with  other  things ;  but  it  must  also  have  been  due  to  some 
inherent  quality  of  the  Itahan  genius,  for,  in  modern  times, 
Madame  de  Stael,  raising  the  same  point  about  the  Itahans 
who  were  her  contemporaries,  asserted  that  they  "  are  afraid 
of  new  ideas,  rather  because  they  are  indolent  than  from 
literary  servihty."  Of  this  latter  fault  we  may  declare  our 
author  guiltless.  He  only  followed  Livius  Andronicus  and 
Naevius  when  he  set  about  his  enterprise  of  translating 
Greek  comedies  into  Latin. 

He  was  entirely  without  the  many  aids  to  Greek  trans- 
lation which  beset  the  modern  novice.  It  was  not  an  age 
of  scholarship,  and  knowledge  of  a  foreign  tongue  was  almost 
certain  to  be  practical  and  not  literary.     The  only  tribunal  >j^ 

W.  B.  1 


2  REMARKS  't)N  iNDIVIDUAL  PLAYS  [CH. 

before  which  Plautus  could  bring  his  work  was  the  general 
pubhc,  and  that  was  a  body  which  could  only  pronounce 
t  approval  or  disapproval;  it  could  not  apply  analytical  and 
intelHgent  criticism.  It  has  been  said  that  a  whole  nation 
constitutes  the  judges  of  dramatic  literature;  but  where 
the  nation  is  too  young  to  be  a  competent  judge,  it  is  a  serious 
drawback  to  the  authors  of  that  hterature.  Plautus  learnt 
his  lesson  in  a  difficult  school,  where  his  faults  were  made 
clear  enough  by  his  audience,  but  remedies  had  to  be  devised 
by  his  own  unaided  wit. 

Since  in  the  hght  of  our  own  generation  we  have  not  yet 
decided  what  good  translation  really  is,  it  is  hardly  surprising 
that  Plautus'  conception  of  it  was  somewhat  inadequate, 
at  any  rate  at  the  beginning  of  his  career.  Probably  his 
best  working  standard,  and  that  at  which  he  eventually, 
if  unconsciously,  arrived,  lay  in  the  words  of  Newman,  the 
translator  of  Homer,  that  a  translation  "shall  affect  our 
countrymen  as  the  original  may  be  conceived  to  have 
affected  its  natural  hearers."  At  first,  however,  he  did  not 
fully  grasp  the  meaning  of  this  condition.  He  expected  that 
the  Roman  theatre  would  be  affected  by  his  Mercator  just 
as  Philemon's  was  by  the  "Eyu,7ro/)09.  This  was  a  mistake. 
Philemon's  audience  felt  that  it  was  hstening  to  a  comedy. 
Plautus'  audience,  had  it  been  capable  of  putting  its  dis- 
satisfaction into  words,  would  have  said  that  it  was  listening 
to  a  piece  of  translation. 

Of  all  Plautus'  plays,  the  Mercator,  as  we  shall  see  later 

in    detail,    has    been    least   re-dressed    in    Roman    colours. 

.  Besides  containing  as  many  references  to  Greek  legend  and 

.      mythology  as  do  any  of  the  other  plays,  it  goes  rather  too 

far  in  other  directions,  for  instance  in  the  long  hst  of  Greek 


l]  THE   ME  RCA  TOR  3 

cities  enumerated  by  Charinus  (1.  646  seq.)  and  in  the  details 
of  his  imaginary  tour  through  the  Greek  isles  (1.  937  seq.), 
which  would  have  been  better  ehminated.  There  is  nothing 
familiar  and  Roman  to  counterbalance  the  effect  of  this. 
Moreover,  had  Plautus  been  an  experienced  playwright,  he 
would  have  welcomed  the  opportunity  of  cutting  down  the 
excessively  long  passage  in  Act  i.  Sc.  ii.,  in  which  Acanthio 
absurdly  delays  giving  his  news  to  his  master.  So  dull  is 
this  (merely  by  reason  of  its  length)  that  one  could  well  beheve 
that  the  hue  (160)  about  the  "slumbering  audience"  was 
improvised  one  day  by  an  observant  actor,  and  incorporated 
later  into  the  text. 

The  Mermtor  is  undoubtedly  the  least  satisfactory  of 
Plautus'  plays,  because  the  author  had  not  realised  that  the 
old  magic  of  Greek  comedy  was  composed  largely  of  the 
indefinable  interplay  of  sympathies  between  hving  actors 
and  living  spectators;  that  all  this  necessarily  died  by  the  ,  ^  »- 
act  of  translation,  and  became  to  a  foreign  audience  only^^^^^,***'^'^^ 
tiresome  and  dull.  The  new  Roman  play  had  to  have  a  ,v^*'''' 
colour  and  an  intensity  of  its  own,  which  could  be  imparted 
only  by  the  living  personal  touch  of  the  new  poet.  All  the 
topical  allusions  and  Uttle  appeahng  Romanisms,  with  which 
he  adorned  his  later  plays,  are  absent  from  the  Mercator. 
Later,  when  he  had  more  grip  over  the  f eehngs  of  his  audience, 
he  saw  truly  that  a  certain  shght  Greek  flavour  about  his 
work  was  essential  to  success,  for  it  requires  a  more  highly 
trained  intelHgence  to  appreciate  the  subtleties  of  a  drama 
concerned  mth  one's  own  sphere  of  hfe,  than  it  does  to  enjoy 
the  broader  effects  of  something  a  little  more  remote  and 
strange;  and  to  the  former  condition  the  Roman  of  that 
age  was  not  yet  educated.     Plautus  learnt,  too,  that  a  good 

1—2 


4  REMARKS   ON   INDIVIDUAL   PLAYS  [CH. 

translation  of  a  play  of  the  New  Comedy  must  be  not  too 
exclusively  falliata,  for  by  not  clinging  too  closely  to  a  literal 
rendering  of  the  plays  he  selected,  he  would  reproduce  more 
nearly  the  spirit,  which  is  the  life. 

But  probably  the  Cistellaria  and  some  other  plays  were 
written  before  he  had  learnt,  in  any  measure,  the  lessons 
of  the  Mercatof. 


2.    The  Poenulus  and  the  Miles  Gloriosus: 
contaminatio 

Plautus,  like  many  other  playwrights,  approached  his 
work  as  the  man  in  the  street.  He  had  no  idea  of  the  diffi- 
culties to  be  overcome,  nor,  we  may  add,  of  the  glory  to  be 
obtained  by  overcoming  them.  Thus,  after  he  had  trans- 
lated a  certain  number  of  comedies  with  some  success,  and 
was  beginning  to  feel  some  assurance  in  his  workmanship, 
it  seemed  the  easiest  thing  in  the  world  to  put  together 
two  parts  of  different  plays,  and  make  a  new  and  complete 
drama,  and  he  was  inclined  to  approach  this  form  of  jig-saw 
puzzle  rather  in  the  spirit  of  a  child  who  mechanically  puts 
the  pieces  together,  than  in  that  of  an  artist  who  considers 
the  structure  as  a  whole.  The  technical  term  for  welding 
parts  of  different  plays  into  a  single  whole  is,  in  Latin, 
contaminatio.  It  obviously  involves  a  certain  amount  of 
enterprise,  indeed  of  originality.  Naevius  had  already 
availed  himself  of  the  method  and  it  is  illuminating  to  see  in 
what  measure  Plautus  profited  by  it. 

As  a  first  example  we  will  consider  the  Poenulus.  It  is 
a  dull  play.  Its  title  suggests  that  it  was  written  after  the 
end  of  the  second  Punic  war,  when  Roman  animosity  towards 


J 


I]  THE   POENULUS  5 

Carthage  had  died  down  sufficiently  to  allow  a  humorous 
aspect  to  their  relations,  but  while  the  interest  in  Carthage 
was  still  prominent  in  the  pubHc  mind.  This  theory  is 
supported  by  1.  524, 

re  populi  pIacida...uiterf€Ctis  hostihvs, 
which  is  probably  a  topical  allusion  because  it  is  so  pointless 
in  the  context.  The  Hanno  who  is  responsible  for  the  name 
of  the  piece  bears  the  same  name  as  the  great  general  who 
took  part  in  the  w^ar.  We  know  of  several  Carthaginians 
named  Hanno,  and  there  were  probably  many  more  whom 
we  do  not  know ;  Macaulay  in  his  poem  of  Virginia  has  a 
Hanno,  the  keeper  of  a  shop  "ghttering  with  Punic  wares/' 
and  probably  this  type  was  familiar  at  Rome. 

The  drama  in  its  main  plot  is  one  of  intrigue,  namely, 
the  slave's  plan  to  get  money  for  his  master,  but  the  motive 
of  "recognition"  plays  a  part  in  the  denouement,  for  Hanno 
discovers  at  Calydon  two  long-lost  daughters  and  a  nephew 
who  is  the  lover  of  one  of  them.  These  two  motives  are 
apparently  derived  from  separate  originals,  and  are  inter- 
woven by  Plautus  with  reasonable  skill;  they  read  like  a 
very  ordinary  translation  of  a  Greek  comedy.  The  whole 
of  the  fifth  act,  however,  at  least  as  far  as  1.  1030,  with  its 
speeches  in  the  Carthaginian  language,  and  their  misinter- 
pretation by  word  sounds  into  Latin,  may  be  accounted 
original  to  Plautus,  as  wtiII  be  shown  in  detail  later  in  our 
enquiry.  The  play  is,  in  fact,  a  clear  case  of  contaminatio — 
the  Kap')(^7]B6vto^  of  some  unknown  author  (if  we  may  accept 
the  information  in  the  post-Plautine  prologue)  plus  part  of 
an  unnamed  play,  plus  an  original  composition  of  Plautus 
himself.  Hanno,  amusing  enough  in  Plautus'  section  of  the 
work,  is  not  exploited  to  the  full.     Indeed,  when  once  he 


6  REMARKS   ON   INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS  [CH. 

begins  latine  loqui,  lie  discards  all  the  enchantment  of  a 
foreigner  except  his  strange  long  robe.  He  has  none  of  the 
sinister  magnetism  of  Mr  Wu,  nor  even  the  hghter  comic 
lines  of  Mr  Hook  of  Holland.  Plautus  has  seized  an  excellent 
idea,  but  he  has  not  nearly  done  it  justice.  He  ought  to 
have  worked  over  the  beginning  and  end  of  the  play,  in  order 
to  make  it  harmonise  with  his  original  contribution. 

This,  presumably  his  first,  attempt  at  contaminatio  was 
thus  creditable,  but  not  brilhant.  We  come  now  to  a  later 
effort.  The  Miles  Gloriosus  undoubtedly  suffers  from  faulty 
construction.  The  cause  of  this  has  been  the  subject  of 
considerable  discussion,  some  critics  beUeving  that  it  is  the 
result  of  late  confusion  of  two  variant  acting  editions.  It 
seems  far  more  probable,  however,  that  it  is  due  to  con- 
taminatio by  the  author  himself.  A  brief  examination  of 
the  plot  will  make  this  clear. 

The  first  act  introduces  PyrgopoUnices,  the  miles,  who 
keeps  imprisoned  in  his  house  at  Ephesus  the  beautiful 
Philocomasiimi,  whom  he  has  carried  off  from  Athens.  He 
has  just  become  the  recipient,  from  a  pirate  friend,  of  a  gift, 
namely  the  captive  Palaestrio,  the  slave  of  the  girl's  lover 
Pleusides.  The  latter,  hearing  thus  of  his  lady's  where- 
abouts, comes  to  Ephesus  and  resides  next  door  to  the  miles, 
at  the  house  of  his  father's  hospitable  friend  Perijdectomenus , 
and  by  means  of  a  secret  door  in  the  party- wall  between  the 
houses,  gains  communication  with  Philocomasium.  Their 
endearments  are,  however,  observed  through  the  impliiuium 
by  a  slave  of  the  ?niles,  and  in  the  second  act  of  the  play, 
the  faithful  Palaestrio  expends  much  ingenuity  in  persuading 
this  worthy  that  the  girl  in  question  is  Philocomasimn  s 
twin  sister,  and  that  the  scandal  he  suspects  does  not  exist. 


l]  THE   MILES  GLORIOSUS  7 

Here  the  story  might  satisfactorily  end,  but  with  the 
third  act  it  takes  a  wholly  new  departure.  Palaestrio 
resolves  to  overreach  the  7niles  by  deluding  him  into  the 
behef  that  he  is  loved  to  distraction  by  the  wife  of  his  neigh- 
bour Periplectomenus.  This  act  is  long,  and  the  sHght 
progress  of  the  plot  is  quite  out  of  proportion  to  its  length. 
The  last  two  acts  unfold  the  execution  of  Palaestrio' s  scheme, 
which  entails  the  rescue  of  Philocomasium  by  her  lover,  and 
the  proper  punishment  of  the  amorous  miles. 

The  loose  construction  of  the  play  is  shown  not  only  in 
the  general  outline  of  the  plot,  which  is  clearly  the  fusion 
of  two  distinct  stories,  but  in  various  details :  for  instance, 
the  parasite  who  forms  such  an  excellent  foil  to  the  miles  in 
the  first  act,  is  completely  missing  from  the  rest  of  the  play. 
It  is,  however,  impossible  not  to  feel  that  the  intensely  vivid 
portrayal  of  the  characters,  and  the  excellent  boisterous  fun 
of  the  whole  thing,  would,  in  the  opinion  of  the  Roman 
spectators,  do  much  to  gloss  over  the  deficiencies  of  a  badly 
patched  plot.  The  details  of  the  play,  as  will  be  seen  later, 
have  been  considerably  Kornanised,  and  the  general  effect 
here  is  much  more  entertaining  than  that  of  the  Poenulus. 

Possibly  the  Stichus,  a  weak,  uninspired  composition, 
is  another  example  of  contaminatio ,  but  it  is  significant  that 
in  his  later  plays  Plautus  never  had  recourse  to  this  process. 
Probably  he  concluded  that  the  amount  of  labour  (always 
Hmited,  if  we  may  beheve  Horace)  that  he  was  prepared 
to  give  to  it,  was  not  worth  the  results  obtained. 


8  remarks  on  individual  plays  [ch. 

3.    The  Rubens:  the  introduction  of  romance 

Much  has  been  written  about  the  dawn  of  romanticism 
in  Greek  Uterature  at  the  period  to  which  the  New  Comedy 
belongs.  The  comedy  itself  was,  in  fact,  an  immediate 
product  of  this  innovation  of  feeling ;  it  was  the  expression 
of  individual  interests,  and  of  the  love  of  pathos  and  emotion 
for  their  own  sake.  The  Alexandrine  love  elegies  were  but 
the  beginning  of  the  vast  stream  of  sentimental  fiction  which 
flowed  with  vigour  even  down  to  late  Byzantine  times. 
From  Menander,  Plautus,  and  Terence,  we  gain  a  fairly 
clear  idea  of  the  main  features  of  this  romanticism  as  it 
appeared  upon  the  stage.  The  hapless  lover,  who  feeds  his 
grief  not  so  much  on  silence  as  on  sohloquy,  is  now  the  most 
important  member  of  society,  and  Diniarchus  (in  the  Trucu- 
lentus)  communing  with  himself  for  the  space  of  a  hundred 
Knes  on  the  sorrows  of  love,  is  suffering  from  an  interesting 
melancholy,  which  later  received  a  new  impetus  from  the 
Eenaissance,  and  has  immortalised  countless  victims  from 
Petrarch  down  to  the  present  day.  Distressed  maidens,  too, 
formerly  a  neghgible  quantity  in  Greek  Uterature,  have  now 
to  be  rescued  or  pursued  so  frequently  from  the  other  ends 
of  the  earth,  or  at  least  from  the  other  side  of  the  Aegean, 
that  it  becomes  a  habit  with  them.  Pasicompsa  (in  the 
Mercator)  is  but  one  of  many  examples. 

In  Plautus,  the  Rudens  is  one  of  the  best  instances  of 
this  kind  of  literature.  The  love  interest  is  strong,  not  only 
in  the  dramatic  adventures  of  the  hero  Plesidippiis ,  but  also 
in  the  passing  fancy  of  Sceparnio  for  the  pretty  serving-maid ; 
the  dehghtful  humour  of  the  slave's  obsequiousness  in  per- 
forming menial  services  for  her  sake,  is  equalled  by  the 


1] 


THE   RUDENS  ^ 


pleasantry  of  his  assertion  in  a  later  scene  that  he  could 
serve  either  heroine  with  impartial  devotion.  The  roman- 
ticism of  the  play,  however,  is  not  confined  to  this  feature, 
which  is  common  to  most  of  Plautus'  dramas.  Far  more 
than  any  other  play,  the  Rudens  has  a  tendency  to  reveal 
the  natural  scenery  in  which  the  story  is  supposed  to  be  set. 
The  characters,  at  the  opening,  are  all  somewhat  breathless 
after  the  raging  tempest  of  the  previous  night,  a  tempest 
which  is  said  to  have  blown  off  the  roofs  and  shattered  the 
windows  of  all  the  neighbouring  houses,  including  that  of 
Daemones,  which  forms  the  background  of  the  stage;  and 
by  manifold  httle  touches  Plautus  indicates  the  clear  sunny 
morning,  in  which  the  only  reminiscence  of  the  departed 
storm  is  the  somewhat  agitated  surf  which  breaks  upon  the 
beach  close  at  hand. 

This  is  going  farther  than  the  majority  of  plays  in  the 
New  Comedy,  but  it  is  in  hue  \sdth  other  branches  of  Greek 
hterature  of  that  period.  It  is  due  to  the  fact  that  poetry 
had  come  under  the  influence  of  painting  (itself  now  growing 
sentimental),  and  was  beginning  to  regard  nature  w4th  the 
eyes  of  Art.  When  the  sun  rose  in  Homer,  it  simply  "gave 
hght"  to  the  world ;  its  rise  in  Alexandrine  writers  is  adorned 
with  a  thousand  pictorial  touches  which  modern  romance 
has  rendered  indispensable  to  our  thought. 

This  great  wave  of  Hellenistic  emotion  is  in  singular 
contrast  vnth  the  reserve  of  ancient  Greece,  and  certainly 
no  less  with,  the  marked  austerity  of  early  Rome.  Until 
towards  the  end  of  the  third  century  B.C.,  Roman  hterature 
was  practically  destitute  of  romance.  Indeed,  the  people 
were  not  prepared  for  it  until  Roman  supremacy  was 
fairly  well  estabhshed  in  and  beyond  Italy,  when  time  and 


10  REMARKS   ON  INDIVIDUAL   PLAYS  [CH. 

interest  were  afforded  for  relaxation  from  the  continuous 
strain  of  a  warfaring  existence.  Credit  is  due  to  Plautus  and 
to  his  contemporary  Naevius,  in  that  they  perceiyed  that 
Rome  was  ready  for  this  element,  and  catered  efficiently 
for  the  new  need.  The  timely  introduction  into  literature 
of  romance,  of  which  the  Rudens  is  a  specimen,  denotes  a 
certain  amount  of  originahty,  eyen  if  the  work  itself  takes 
the  form  of  translation.  Greek  romance  was  always  a  hard}^ 
growth,  self-sufficing  to  a  large  extent,  and  typical  of  a 
literature  w^hich  was  always  accustomed  to  take  little  and 
to  giye  much.  It  is  not  strange  that  Rome  w^as  content  to 
adopt  it  in  its  existing  form,  w^ithout  attempting  to  modify 
it  or  to  blend  it  with  any  quality  of  her  own.  The  gift  of 
Menander  and  his  fellow- dramatists  to  Plautus  was  no  more 
and  no  less  than  what,  in  a  far  more  advanced  and  literary 
age,  Ovid  took  from  Callimachus. 

An  interesting  parallel  occurs  in  the  thirteenth  century 
A.D.,  when  Greece  and  the  Aegean  islands  passed  under  the 
rule  of  Frank  invaders,  the  exponents  of  western  chivalry. 
The  resulting  harvest  of  romances,  including  stories  such  as 
Belthandros  and  Chrysantza,  and  Lyhistros  and  Rhodamne, 
is  essentially  Greek  in  origin,  and  all  the  western  touches, 
unmistakably  inherited  from  the  French  romans  d\iventure, 
are  adventitious  and  decorative. 

Thus  it  was  not  once  only  that  stories  and  motives  of 
romance  travelled  from  Greece  to  the  West,  and  proved 
strong  enough  to  impart  to  a  new  literature  the  power  and 
freshness  which  had  characterised  the  old. 


l]  THE   P^SEUDOLU."^  H 

4.    The  Pseu dolus  and  the  Truoulentus: 
Plautus'  ideal 

Qimn  gaudehat...Truculenio  Plautus,  quam  Pseudolo ! 

If  this  tradition,  preserved  by  Cicero,  be  true— and  we 
have  no  reasonable  ground  for  doubting  it— it  is  interesting  to 
consider  what  there  was  in  these  two  plays  that  gave  Plautus 
such  particular  satisfaction.  It  is  true  that  an  artist  often 
singles  out  for  his  personal  preference  one  of  his  works  which 
all  critics  unite  in  placing  lower  in  their  estimate :  Milton, 
for  instance,  stands  almost  alone  in  regarding  Paradise 
Regained  as  the  most  precious  monument  to  his  genius.  Yet 
it  is  probable  that  the  artist  himself,  in  selecting  his  favourite 
work,  is  conscious  of  something  in  it  most  consonant  with 
his  own  personahty.  He  who,  in  the  process  of  creation, 
has  experienced  every  wonderful  moment  of  inspiration, 
and  every  despairing  difficulty,  will  know  exactly  how  much 
of  himself,  and  how  much  of  his  best,  he  has  put  into  a  certain 
work,  and  will  be  Hnked  with  it  by  all  the  sympathy  natural 
towards  a  most  cherished  ofispring.  That  is  why  it  is  im- 
portant, in  considering  the  original  element  in  Plautus,  to 
bear  in  mind  these  two  plays  as  coming  nearest  to  the 
author's  own  ideal  of  composition. 

Later  opinion  has  gone  fully  with  his  affection  for  the  Pseii- 
dolus,  from  A.  Gelhus,  who  called  it  a  conwedia  festiuissiina, 
to  Lorenz,  who,  apparently  with  Plautus  himself,  declared  it 
to  be  the  creation  of  the  writer's  own  genius  more  than  any 
other  play.  Plautus  here  revels  in  the  high  dramatic  in- 
vention bequeathed  to  him  by  the  original  Greek  author, 
and  all  his  own  most  exuberant  and  spontaneous  powers 
are  brought  into  action  to  deck  it  in  the  best  Plautine  beauty. 


12  REMARKS   ON  INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS  [CH. 

The  native  Roman  element  is,  as  we  shall  see,  particularly 
strong.  The  people  of  that  age  required  broad  and  striking 
effects,  and  in  the  Pseudolus  they  certainly  found  them. 
The  plot  is  one  of  the  familiar  fnistrationes  in  comoecliis, 
which,  so  long  as  they  were  well  worked  out,  were  at  that 
time  not  too  much  hackneyed  to  please.  The  language  of 
the  play  is  marked  by  untrammelled  flights  of  native  idiom. 
The  delineation  of  the  characters  is  completely  reahstic. 
The  lover  Calidorus,  "sighing  like  a  furnace,"  Ballio,  with 
his  unusual  depths  of  heartless  villainy,  and  the  sycophant, 
with  his  inordinate  cleverness,  are  set  with  consummate 
skill  to  interplay  with  the  unforgettable  Puck-hke  creation 
which  is  Pseudolus,  and  which,  we  may  well  beheve,  is  nearly 
akin  to  a  great  part  of  Plautus  himself. 

The  Truculentus  is,  according  to  modern  canons,  a  less 
pleasant  play.  Yet,  inasmuch  as  Plautus  resembled  Zola 
in  a  certain  delight  in  following  human  corruption  into  its 
last  retreats,  he  may  have  felt  some  pride  in  his  extraordi- 
narily detailed  study  of  the  woman  Phronesium.  The  love- 
lorn braggart  captain  Stratophanes,  too,  certainly  plays  his 
part  mth  what  Hazhtt  was  fond  of  calling  "gusto."  The 
taming  of  the  dour  Truculentus  is  prettily,  though  slightly, 
done;  as  is  often  the  case  with  Plautus'  plays,  it  is  dis- 
appointing to  find  so  httle  made  of  the  suggestions  in  the 
title.  Nevertheless,  the  play  has  its  very  broad  humour, 
its  decided  swing  of  action,  and  its  most  gifted  observation 
of  the  large  faults,  small  foibles,  and  dehcate  Kghter  hues  of 
human  character,  quahties  which  go  far  to  make  up  the 
quintessence  of  Plautinism;  and  it  was  probably  of  these 
that  Plautus  was  most  conscious  when  he  judged  this  drama 
as  belonging  to  his  best  work. 


I]  THE   AMPHITRUO  13 

The  Pseudolus  is  dated  by  the  didascalia  in  191  B.C.  It 
would  in  any  case  be  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  these 
two  plays  were  the  last  works  of  Plautus,  for,  had  they  been, 
there  would  have  remained  so  Httle  of  his  hfe  in  which  he 
could  rejoice  in  their  merits,  that  Cicero's  tradition  would 
have  had  no  time  to  form ;  but  they  certainly  belong  to  the 
period  of  his  maturer  genius,  and  as  such  they  are  to  be 
appreciated. 

Lastly,  they  are  both  quickened  by  a  strong  Roman 
element,  and  it  is  not  least  the  reminiscences  of  Rome,  Italy, 
and  all  the  nearest  and  most  precious  associations,  that  would 
endear  these  two  plays  to  the  heart  of  their  creator. 

5.    The  Amphjtruo:  the  gift  of  Euripides 

The  considerable  influence  of  Euripides  upon  Plautus 
has  been  much  discussed  and  is  universally  admitted.  Leo 
rightly  points  out  that  the  New  Comedy  was  rooted  more  in 
Euripidean  tragedy  than  in  the  Old  Comedy,  and  though 
he  goes  much  too  far  in  setting  out  his  very  quaint  parallels 
between  passages  of  Euripides  and  of  Plautus,  we  cannot 
fail  to  see  that,  in  the  general  treatment  and  structure  of 
the  plays,  Plautus  and  Menander  are  at  a  point  of  develop- 
ment but  httle  beyond  that  reached  by  the  tragic  dramatist 
in  the  later  part  of  his  career. 

The  Amphitnio,  however,  is  the  gift  of  Euripides  in  quite 
a  different  way,  and  calls  for  special  comment.     The  play 
is  constructed  on  a  tragic  basis  which  would  satisfy  even  our 
most  ardent  analysts  of  Euripidean  drama: 
1 — 152,  prologue. 
153 — 462,  agon  between  Mercurius  and  Sosia. 


14  REMARKS   ON  INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS  [CH. 

463 — 550,  a  kind  of  stasimon  (at  any  rate  the  action 

remains  " stationary  " ). 
551 — 632,  agon  between  Aniphitruo  and  Sosia. 
633 — 983,  agon  between  Alcmena  and  Amphitriu),  the 

latter  partly  in  the  person  of  Juppiter. 
984 — 1052,  another  stasimon. 
1053 — 1130,  messenger's  speech,  with  threnos. 
1131 — 1143,  deux  ex  machina. 
1144 — 1145,  Amphitruo  as  chorus,  ''Well,  I  never!" 
We  do  not  know  that  Euripides  wrote  a.n  Amphitruo,  but 
he  certainly  wrote  an  Alcmena,  and  that  Plautus  had  at 
least  heard  of  it  is  proved  by  1.  86  of  the  Rudens^.     Several 
fragments  of  it  are  extant,  but  none  are  very  certain  parallels 
to  any  passages  in  the  Roman  version. 

The  Plautine  story  is  the  well-known  Greek  legend  of 
Juppiter,  Alcmene,  and  Amphitruo.  The  whole  drama,  in 
an  entirely  comic  vein,  is  played  in  the  stately  world  of  myth- 
ology, and  from  the  post-Plautine  prologue  we  learn  that 
such  a  work  was  termed  tragico-comoedia.  The  Greek 
corresponding  to  this  is  IXaporpayMSca,  and  it  has  been 
suggested  that  the  Amphitruo  was  based  on  an  original  by 
the  Sicilian  Rhinthon,  who  is  known  to  have  written  dramas 
of  this  kind.  This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  in  detail 
Plautus'  debt  to  Sicily;  in  this  instance  it  probably  does 
not  go  beyond  the  barest  suggestion  of  the  general  idea. 

Another  suggestion  concerning  the  Amphitruo  is  that 
the  original  was  by  a  writer  of  the  New  Comedy.  This 
seems  nearer  to  the  truth,  and  yet  it  is  not  quite  in  line  with 
the  probabihties.  One  of  the  main  features  of  Plautus'  play 
is  that  it  is  so  thoroughly  Roman  in  every  detail.  Amphitruo 
^  non  uentus  fuit,  uerum  Alcumena  Euripidi, 


I]  THE   AMPniTRUO  15 

is  just  a  typical  Roman  general.  His  campaign  against  the 
Teleboans  has  been  conducted  according  to  Roman  methods 
(as  will  be  seen  later  in  detail).      He  returns  home  to  the 


EKRATUM 
p.  14  line  8  for  deux  read  deus 


.^^w  ^v»^w^--   u_..^v^xxi.v*,i  v/iiviijuLgiv/ixi^/iXLo    \>  iicii  lic   tries   LU  expiam 

the  novel  situation  to  his  master,  and  his  almost  pathetic 
last  appeal  to  Alcmena  to  elucidate  the  puzzle,  are  all  por- 
trayed by  a  master-mind.  No  part  of  the  play,  from  the 
first  line  to  the  last,  reads  Kke  a  translation.  By  far  the  most 
probable  conclusion  at  which  the  reader  can  arrive,  is  that 
it  is  a  direct  burlesque  of  Euripides  by  Plautus,  who  has  : 
taken  the  old  Greek  story  and  inserted  it  into  the  ordinary  I 
hfe  of  his  contemporary  Romans.  Burlesque  is  often  con-  ' 
sidered  a  cheap  form  of  hterature,  but  in  those  days  it  was 
not  so  hackneyed  as  it  is  now,  and  a  comparison  of  this  play 
with  the  versions  of  MoHere  and  Dryden  is  sufficient  to  show 
that  it  cannot  be  less  than  a  mature  work  of  a  supreme 
dramatist,  tossed  off,  perhaps,  as  the  pastime  of  a  hght  or 
hurried  hour,  but  no  unworthy  product  of  a  mind,  which, 
beyond  rich  and  rare  gifts  of  its  own,  owed  much  to  the 
Euripidean  school  in  which  it  had  unconsciously  trained 
itself. 


14  REMARKS   ON   INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS  [CH. 

463 — 550,  a  kind  of  stasimon  (at  any  rate  the  action 
remains  "  stationary  " ) . 


to  any  passages  in  the  Roman  version. 

The  Plautine  story  is  the  well-known  Greek  legend  of 
Jwpjfdter,  Alcmene,  and  Amphitruo.  The  whole  drama,  in 
an  entirely  comic  vein,  is  played  in  the  stately  world  of  myth- 
ology, and  from  the  post-Plautine  prologue  we  learn  that 
such  a  work  was  termed  tragico-comoedia.  The  Greek 
corresponding  to  this  is  IXaporpaytpSla,  and  it  has  been 
suggested  that  the  Amjphitruo  was  based  on  an  original  by 
the  Sicilian  Rhinthon,  who  is  known  to  have  written  dramas 
of  this  kind.  This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  in  detail 
Plautus'  debt  to  Sicily;  in  this  instance  it  probably  does 
not  go  beyond  the  barest  suggestion  of  the  general  idea. 

Another  suggestion  concerning  the  A7n])hitruo  is  that 
the  original  was  by  a  writer  of  the  New  Comedy.  This 
seems  nearer  to  the  truth,  and  yet  it  is  not  quite  in  line  with 
the  probabilities.  One  of  the  main  features  of  Plautus'  play 
is  that  it  is  so  thoroughly  Roman  in  every  detail.  Amphitruo 
^  non  uerdus  Juity  uerum  Alcumena  Euripidi. 


I]  THE    AMPniTRUO  15 

is  just  a  typical  Roman  general.  His  campaign  against  the 
Teleboans  has  been  conducted  according  to  Roman  methods 
(as  will  be  seen  later  in  detail).  He  returns  home  to  the 
tune  of  Roman  sacrifices  and  auspices,  and  is  greeted  by  a 
wife  who  is  the  noblest  embodiment  of  the  Roman  matron 
that  ever  walked  the  Roman  stage. 

The  other  outstanding  feature  of  the  play  is  its  extra- 
ordinary vivacity  and  spontaneity.  Tremendously  alive  as 
most  of  Plautus'  plays  are,  they  hardly  touch  the  unflagging 
vigour  of  the  Amphitruo.  In  the  scenes  with  the  slave 
Sosia,  especially,  the  fun  is  fast  and  furious.  His  complete 
bewilderment  when  he  meets  Mercury  arrayed  as  his  double, 
iiis  semi-conviction  that  he  is  not  himself,  but  another  man, 
his  further  mental  entanglements  when  he  tries  to  explain 
the  novel  situation  to  his  master,  and  his  almost  pathetic 
last  appeal  to  Alcmena  to  elucidate  the  puzzle,  are  all  por- 
trayed by  a  master-mind.  No  part  of  the  play,  from  the 
first  line  to  the  last,  reads  hke  a  translation.  By  far  the  most 
probable  conclusion  at  which  the  reader  can  arrive,  is  that 
it  is  a  direct  burlesque  of  Euripides  by  Plautus,  who  has 
taken  the  old  Greek  story  and  inserted  it  into  the  ordinary 
Hfe  of  his  contemporary  Romans.  Burlesque  is  often  con- 
sidered a  cheap  form  of  hterature,  but  in  those  days  it  was 
not  so  hackneyed  as  it  is  now,  and  a  comparison  of  this  play 
with  the  versions  of  Moliere  and  Dryden  is  sufficient  to  show 
that  it  cannot  be  less  than  a  mature  work  of  a  supreme 
dramatist,  tossed  off,  perhaps,  as  the  pastime  of  a  hght  or 
hurried  hour,  but  no  unworthy  product  of  a  mind,  which, 
beyond  rich  and  rare  gifts  of  its  own,  owed  much  to  the 
Euripidean  school  in  which  it  had  unconsciously  trained 
itself. 


16  THE   ORIGINAL   ELEMENT  [CH. 

CHAPTER   II 

THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT 
1.    Historical  allusions 

Der  den  Augenblick  ergreift. 

Das  ist  der  rechte  Mann. 

Goethe. 

It  is  rather  a  surprise  to  find  historical  allusions  in  Plant  us. 
The  New  Comedy  probably  contained  Httle  of  the  kind.  It 
was  almost  wholly  social,  the  comedy  of  domestic  Kfe  and 
manners.  Besides  this  lack  of  suggestion  in  his  model,  the 
Roman  poet  was  confronted  with  a  strict  law  against  the 
representation  of  any  pohtics  or  pubhc  personalities  upon 
the  stage,  a  law  which  was  enforced  as  far  as  possible  by 
stringent  police  supervision  at  each  performance.  It  must 
however  have  been  felt  that  essentially  popular  plays  hke 
the  Plautine  comedy  made  a  stronger  appeal  by  containing 
brief  allusions  to  contemporary  pubhc  events,  and  Plautus, 
in  several  instances,  defies  the  censorship  and  presents  us 
incidentally  with  a  certain  amount  of  material  for  dating 

his  plays. 

In  the  M.  G.  (1.  211)  the  attitude  of  Palaestrio,  who 
supports  his  head  on  his  hand  and  arm,  as  if  on  a  column 
{os  columnatum),  reminds  Plautus  of  his  brother-poet  Naevius, 
who  was  imprisoned  for  his  lampoons  on  the  aristocracy, 
particularly   on   the  proud   Metelli.     The  im- 
^°^    ■  prisonment  of  Naevius  is  placed  about  210-207 

B.C.,  and  the  passage  was  written  certainly  after  the  imprison- 
ment began,  probably  while  it  was  still  the  subject  of  common 
talk,  and  possibly  before  the  release  of  the  victim.     The 


n]  HISTORICAL  ALLUSIONS  17 

allusion  is  however  made  more  remote  by  its  application,  not 
to  Naevius  by  name,  but  to  a  poeta  barbarus.  Plautus  here, 
as  frequently  elsewhere,  uses  the  word  barbarus  in  the  sense 
it  would  have  in  his  Greek  originals,  i.e.  "not  Greek-speak- 
ing," and  therefore  Roman.  (Thus  in  Poen.  598,  barbaria 
is  used  as  a  synonym  for  Italy.)  Such  a  device  has  the 
appearance  of  being  derived  direct  from  the  Greek,  and 
would  make  it  difl&cult  for  the  Roman  pohce  to  charge  the 
author  with  an  ofience  against  the  regulations  in  question. 

In  the  same  play  there  occurs  another  historical  allusion 
in  the  phrase  si  harunc  Baccharum  es  (1.  1016).  The  frenzied 
and  disreputable  orgies  which  formed  the  rites  of  Bacchus 
were  suppressed  by  a  famous  decree  of  the  Senate  in  186  B.C., 
but  were  probably  the  subject  of  much  comment  and  specu- 
lation before  drastic  steps  were  actually  taken.  Plautus 
refers  again  to  the  same  topic,  e.g.  Cas.  979. 

The  end  of  the  speech  of  Auxilium  in  the  Cistellaria  con- 
tains an  important  reference  to  the  second  Pimic  war.  It  is  a 
stirring  appeal  to  the  people  of  Rome  to  make 

.  .  205  B.C.(?) 

a  final  and  supreme  effort  to  gain  the  victory 
which  is  already  nearly  within  their  grasp. 

Other  plays  appear  to  contain  references  to  laws  which 
were  inaugurated  or  repealed  during  Plautus'  lifetime. 
When  Ejfddicus,  in  the  play  of  that  name 
(224  seq.)  discourses  at  length  on  the  wanton 
and  reprehensible  extravagance  of  ladies'  dress,  he  doubtless 
spoke  just  about  the  time  of  the  repeal  of  the  lex  Opjria 
smnptuaria  in  195.  Pseud.  303  alludes  to  the  lex  quiniui- 
cenaria,  the  law  by  which  young  people  under  twenty-five 
were  incapable  of  making  contracts.  Cicero  calls  it  the  lex 
Plaetoria,  but  its  date  is  unknown. 

W.  E.  2 


18  THE  ORIGIlSrAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

The  Curculio  (1.   508)  contains  a  reference  to  the  lex 
Semvronia  de  foenore  of  193.     But  the  chief 

103  B  C 

interest  of  this  play,  from  the  historical  aspect, 
Hes  elsewhere.  The  scene  is  laid  at  Epidaurus,  outside  the 
temple  of  Aesculapius.  From  the  Plutus  of  Aristophanes 
we  know  what  function  to  expect  this  highly-esteemed  deity 
to  perform.  His  rdle  here  is  as  conventional  and  blameless 
as  ever.  The  villain  Cappodax  has  spent  the  night  lying  in 
the  temple,  to  cure  himself  of  certain  diseases,  and  in  the 
morning  he  issues  forth,  to  the  dehght  of  the  audience,  not 
a  whit  the  better  for  his  experiences.  It  is  all  meant  to  be 
extremely  funny,  and  a  good  deal  is  made  of  it ;  but  we  might 
beheve  that  it  fell  a  Httle  flat  on  Roman  ears,  were  there  not 
another  factor  to  be  considered.  At  Rome,  the  worship  of 
this  god  was  introduced  by  order  of  the  Sibylline  books, 
on  the  occasion  of  the  plague  of  293,  and  the  deity  was 
brought  from  Epidaurus  in  the  form  of  a  snake.  He  had 
a  sanctuary  and  a  much  frequented  sanatorium  on  the  island 
of  the  Tiber.  It  seems  extremely  probable  that  there  was 
some  sort  of  centenary  celebration  in  honour  of  the  god,  and 
Aesculapius  being  thus  prominent  in  the  pubhc  mind,  Plautus, 
from  the  store  of  Greek  comedies  at  his  command,  sought  and 
found  this  particular  play  to  appeal  to  the  popular  sense  of 
humour  at  an  opportune  moment.  This  theory  is  supported, 
in  quite  a  curious  way,  by  the  date  of  the  lex  Sempronia 
mentioned  above.  It  may  be  noted  in  passing  that  Lyco, 
the  banker,  is  made  to  do  obeisance  to  Aesculapius  capite 
operto,  a  distinctly  Roman  and  not  Greek  custom. 

In  Trin.  542  we  are  told  of  the  wonderful  powers  of 
endurance  of  the  Syrian  slaves,  a  fact  which  probably  did 
not  force  itself  particularly  on  the  Roman  notice  until  after 


II]  HISTORICAL   ALLUSIOIJiS  19 

the  war  with  Antiochus  in  191.  Three  lines  later,  how- 
ever, their  strength  is  said  to  be  surpassed  by  that  of  the 
Campanians,  who,  as  the  result  of  the  supplicium 
inflicted  on  them  for  their  desertion  of  Rome 
in  the  second  Punic  war,  became  so  inured  to  the  hardest 
forms  of  slavery,  that  they  could  excel  all  other  races  in 
endm^ance  of  toil.  The  mention  of  their  name  would  fill 
the  Roman  spectator  with  a  bitter  satisfaction  at  the  proper 
reward  of  treachery. 

In  the  Bacchides  (1.  1073),  the  slave  Chrysalus,  assuming, 
hke  many  of  his  fellows  (as  will  be  seen  later),  the  character 
of  a  victorious  general,  begs  the  spectators  not  to  be  surprised 
at  his  not  celebrating  his  achievements  with  a  triumph,  on 
the  plea  peruolgatum  est.  Probably  after  the  four  triumphs 
of  the  year  189,  the  Roman  people  were  becom- 
ing  somewhat  blase  over  these  functions,  and 
Chrysalus  is  here  hinting  at  the  fact  that  triumphs,  if  made 
too  common,  were  Hkely  to  lose  their  value  and  prestige. 

References  in  these  plays  to  Greek  history  are  almost 
neghgible.  Agathocles  is  twice  mentioned  alone  {Pseud.  532, 
Most.  775),  and  in  Men.  407,  there  is  a  curious  httle  bit  of 
Sicihan  history  which  seems  to  stop  abruptly  with  Hiero ; 
this  suggests  that  in  the  original  that  monarch  has  been  the 
subject  of  prolonged  eulogies  which  Plautus  thought  would 
bore  a  Roman  audience,  and  which  he  therefore  cut  out  in 
no  very  skilful  manner. 

The  Roman  history  in  these  plays  must  be  borne  in  mind 
as  being  of  great  importance,  as  its  source  is  so  indisputably 
Plautine  and  not  Greek. 


2—2 


20  the  original  element  [ch. 

2.    Roman  geography 

(a)    Rome 

All  roads  lead  to  Rome. 

Proverb. 

The  scene  of  each  play  of  Plautus  is  laid  in  some  Greek 

city,  generally  Athens,  although  variants  are  found,  such  as 

Sicyon,  Epidamnus,  Ephesus  and  Cyrene.     No  local  colour 

is  attached  to  any  of  these  places,  except  perhaps  Cyrene, 

and  beyond  one  or  two  occasions  when  an  inhabitant  of 

Athens  declares  his  intention  of  going  to  the  Peiraeus  (e.g. 

Trin.  1103)  no  allusion  is  made  to  any  local  topography. 

But  it  was  not  Plautus'  way  to  leave  the  situation  thus 

neutral  or  indifferent.     Often,  indeed,  we  forget  that  we  are 

at  Athens  or  at  Calydon,  only  to  realise  with  a  start  that 

we  are  walking  the  streets  of  Rome,  with  all  the  setting  of 

immemorial   names    and   associations    around   us    as    they 

surrounded  the  actors  of  the  plays. 

1\i^  forum  is  mentioned  so  frequently  and  in  such  general 

terms,  that,  although  the  word  entails  a  marked  suggestion 

of  Rome,  we  can  regard  it  only  as  a  translation  of  the  New 

Comedy  a^yopd.     There  are  many  other  Roman  locahties 

in  Plautus  which  are  perfectly  well  defined.     The  Capitol 

is  mentioned  at  least  twice,  Trin.  84,  and  Cure.  269.     In 

~  the  latter  play  the  speech  of  the  choragus  describes  a  kind 

of  route-march  through  the  city.     First  in  the  Kst  comes  the 

temple  of  Cloacina  (Venus),  the  "purifier,"  so  called  because 

the  Romans  at  the  end  of  the  Sabine  war  purified  themselves 

with  myrtle-branches  near  her  statue:    then  the  Basilica, 

which  is  referred  to  also  in  Capt.  815,  and  is  something  of  a 

problem,  for  the  first  basilica  (a  portico  or  arcade)  that  we 

hear  of  at  Rome  was  built  by  Cato  the  Censor  in  184  (the 


n]  ROMAN  GEOGRAPHY  21 

year  of  Plautus'  death)  and  called  the  basilica  Porcia.  The 
Plautine  basilica  may  be  an  earUer  building,  otherwise  un- 
known, or  an  anticipation  of  something  already  long  planned 
and  discussed  by  idle  tongues :  in  any  case  there  is  no  need 
to  agree  with  certain  critics  who  reject  the  lines  in  which  it 
occurs.  Next  the  choragus  takes  us  to  the  forum,  with  its 
crowd  of  idle  and  wealthy  loungers :  then  to  the  unkind 
chatterers  around  the  lacws  (probably  the  lacus  Curtius) : 
then  to  the  temple  of  Castor,  on  the  spot  where  three  marble 
pillars  of  a  later  date  greet  the  sight-seer  to  this  day ;  hence 
to  the  "Tuscan  region"  of  doubtful  repute,  and  finally  to 
the  Uelahrum,  with  its  bakers,  butchers,  and  soothsayers, 
and  others  of  a  motley  gathering. 

The  Uelabrum  is  mentioned  also  in  Capt.  489,  particularly 
as  the  market  for  delicacies  of  the  table,  where  the  oil-sellers 
were  noted  for  scheming  together  to  keep  up  the  price  of 
salad-oil.  The  same  play  (1.  90)  contains  a  reference  to  the 
Porta  Trigemina  (so  called  from  its  three  archways),  which 
was  in  one  of  the  busiest  parts  of  Rome,  at  the  corner  of  the 
Aventine ;  here  porters  and  message-carriers  took  their  stand, 
and  Ergasilus  says  he  will  have  to  take  his  place  among 
them  to  earn  a  hving  (cf.  Trin.  423). 

In  the  M.  G.  (1.  359)  the  phrase  extra  portam  probably 
refers  to  the  EsquiUne  Gate,  where  was  the  burying-ground 
of  the  poor,  and  where  executions  took  place.  In  this  in- 
stance, we  may  note,  the  Roman  gate  is  placed  at  Ephesus. 
(Cf.  Pseud.  331,  Cas.  354.) 


22  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

(6)     Italy 

Open  my  heart,  and  you  will  see 

Graved  inside  of  it,  "Italy." 

Browning, 

It  would  be  strange  if  the  original  element  in  Plautus 
excluded  thoughts  of  Italy,  for  Italy  was  a  motherland 
whose  spirit  was  peculiarly  present  in  the  hearts  of  all  her 
sons.  We  do  not  expect  from  a  comic  poet  such  a  panegyric 
as  Vergil  rendered  her  in  later  times ;  indeed,  the  date  alone 
would  be  sufficient  explanation  of  the  fact  that  Plautus 
could  make  no  attempt  at  Vergil's  "conscious  appeal  to  a 
nation."  The  New  Comedy  of  Greece  was  singularly  devoid 
of  national  interests,  and  it  is  thus  all  the  more  remarkable 
that  in  the  translation  of  such  a  literature  we  find  fore- 
shadowed a  feehng  which  attained  conscious  expression  only 
after  years  more  of  silent  development.  The  Hannibahc  war 
did  much  to  awaken  and  strengthen  this  feehng.  Marsian 
and  Apulian  had  fought  side  by  side  in  the  Roman  army, 
and  had  begun  to  forget  the  old  clan  distinctions,  and  to 
take  a  more  kindly  interest  in  one  another.  It  was,  more- 
over, a  period  of  road-building,  and  great  arteries  like  the 
Via  Flaminia  (220)  and  the  Via  Aemilia  (190)  did  much  to 
link  widely-separated  regions  into  a  common  thought  and 
kinship.  Sentiment  became  less  local  and  detached.  This 
new  interest  in  Italy  as  a  whole  does  not  take  in  Plautus 
the  form  of  discourses  on  the  charm  of  her  natural  scenery, 
for  Plautus  lived  in  a  comparatively  unlettered  age  which 
had  not  attained  the  power  of  reflection  necessary  to  appre- 
ciate the  beauty  which  is  so  famihar  as  to  be  unnoticed.  His 
few  descriptions  of  scenery  are  limited  to  seascapes,  a  charac- 
teristically Greek  attitude  of  mind,  derived  probably  direct 


II]  ROMAN   GEOGRAPHY  23 

from  his  original.  His  references  to  the  habits  and  thoughts 
of  the  Itahan  countryside  will  be  considered  later.  Here 
we  are  concerned  only  with  definite  allusions  to  various 
localities  in  the  peninsula. 

A  single  bad  pun  {Most.  770)  is  his  only  reference  to  his 
birthplace,  Sarsina  in  Umbria.  Even  this  has  no  personal 
connotation,  though  it  may  have  ehcited  an  extra  roar  of 
enthusiasm  from  an  audience  acquainted  with  his  origin. 
Capt.  160  seq.  contains  a  string  of  puns  on  a  number  of 
Itahan  place-names — pistor,  a  miller,  and  Pistoria,  a  town 
in  Etruria ;  panis,  a  loaf,  and  Panna,  a  town  in  Samnium ; 
placenta,  a  cake,  and  Placentia,  in  Cis-padane  Gaul;  and  so 
on.  In  a  later  passage  (881  seq.)  of  the  same  play  we  find 
a  similar  volley  of  expletives,  beginning  with  Kopa,  which 
besides  being  the  Greek  name  of  Proserpine,  was  the  name 
of  a  town  in  Latium,  and  led  the  excited  parasite  Ergasilus, 
by  a  natural  train  of  ideas,  to  swear  by  all  the  other  towns 
in  Latium  he  could  think  of — Praeneste,  Signia,  Frusino, 
Alatrium.  In  a  different  country,  after  more  than  two 
thousand  years,  this  is  a  cold  and  uninspiring  theme:  but 
it  is  very  significant. 

Praeneste  is  ridiculed  for  its  provinciaUsm  in  Trin.  609, 
inasmuch  as  it  was  addicted  to  the  expression  tarn  tnodo; 
and  in  True.  691  it  is  assailed  for  dropping  unaccented 
syllables  in  its  pronunciation,  and  saying,  for  instance, 
conea  instead  of  ciconia.  Finally,  a  fragment  of  the  first 
act  of  the  Bacchides  seems  to  give  it  a  reputation  for  bragging 
and  conceit.  The  reason  why  this  city  should  be  singled  out 
as  an  object  of  popular  raillery  is  a  little  obscure.  By  its 
loyalty  during  the  recent  war  it  had,  together  with  Tibur 
and  the  neighbouring  colonies,  done  much  to  save  the  state. 


24  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

but  after  the  war  its  treatment  by  Rome  became  rather  a 
delicate  question.  Perhaps  its  resentment  at  increased 
military  service  and  curtailed  allotments  was  sufficient  to 
raise  a  careless  laugh  among  the  populace  of  victorious  Rome. 

Similarly  Aminula  is  decried  in  M.  G.  648,  where  Peri- 
plectomenus  pointedly  states  that  his  birthplace  was  not  this 
little  town  of  Apulia,  but  Ephesus.  He  thus  suggests  that 
his  Hellenism  was  the  genuine  article,  not  the  superficial 
counterfeit  which  was  found  among  the  ApuUans,  who  had 
notorious  aspirations  in  that  direction. 

There  are  references  to  Capua  (Rud.  631),  Sutrium 
(Cas.  524),  Arretium  (fr.  of  t\iQ  Fretmn) ,  Lauinia  (True.  275, 
reading  doubtful),  Tarentine  sheep  (True.  649),  Tuscan 
morals  (Cist.  562),  Campanian  carpets  (Ps.  146),  and,  to 
crown  the  list,  the  fruit  of  the  celebrated  Massic  vine  (Ps. 
1303),  which  still  awaited  Horace's  immortalising  eulogy. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  phrase  tricae  (meaning 
"nonsense,"  e.g.  Cure.  613)  is  (at  least  according  to  Pliny, 
whose  testimony  must  not  be  overvalued)  taken  from  Trica, 
the  name  of  a  small  place  in  Apulia.  In  the  same  way 
Martial  uses  Apina,  a  poor  town  of  the  same  district. 


(c)     The  rest  of  the  Roman  world 

Chi  sa  la  strada,  pu6  andar  di  trotto. 

Italian  pi^overh. 

By  the  age  of  Plautus,  Rome  was  becoming  conscious 
of  a  large  Mediterranean  world  beyond  the  compass  of  its 
own  peninsula.  Greece  too  had  been  aware  of  much  the 
same  world,  but  Rome  naturally  surveyed  it  from  a  different 
angle.     The  country  which  she  regarded  from  a  particularly 


Il]  ROMAN   GEOGRAPHY  25 

Roman  and  revised  standpoint  was  of  course  Greece  itself, 
and  when  this  standpoint  appears  in  Plautus  it  must  be 
noted  as  foreign  to  the  original  Greek.  A  Greek,  for  instance, 
would  never  use  the  word  pergraecari,  or  its  equivalent,  as 
Plautus  frequently  does  (e.g.  True.  88,  Most.  960),  meaning 
*'to  indulge  in  excessively  hilarious  carousals":  neither 
would  he  apply  the  adjective  "Greek"  to  the  ordinary 
things  of  his  hfe,  any  more  than  a  Scot  would  talk  of  a 
"Scotch  mist"  in  the  manner  of  the  detached  Southron. 
In  Plautus  we  find  Greek  caskets  (True.  55),  Greek  sweating- 
baths  [Stich.  226)  and  Greek  honour,  or  rather  the  lack  of 
it  {Asia.  199),  and  many  other  commodities  from  that  side  of 
the  Adriatic. 

Turning  farther  to  the  west  than  the  Greek  could  easily 
penetrate  in  thought,  we  find  a  reference  to  Gaul  in  one  of 
the  fragments,  to  the  Boii  {CapL  888),  to  the  people  of 
Massilia  (Cas.  963)  bearing  out  what  Cicero  says  of  their 
character  in  his  speech  pro  Flacco ;  and  to  the  Turdetani  of 
Spain  (Capt.  163).  In  the  phrase  Hilurica  fades ,  and  in  the 
innumerable  references  to  things  Sicihan,  Greek  and  Roman 
meet  on  common  ground,  and  the  originahty  thereof  may 
be  attributed  to  either  with  equal  probabihty. 

Names  of  places  in  the  extreme  East  of  the  Mediterranean, 
and  beyond  (which  are  comparatively  rare  in  Plautus) 
were  probably,  on  the  whole,  taken  direct  from  the  Greek 
drama.  One  remembers,  for  instance,  that  the  despairing 
lover  in  Menander's  Samia  called  for  his  cloak  and  sword 
and  swore  to  hide  his  diminished  head  in  Bactria  or  Caria. 
Curculio^s  mission  to  Caria  had  thus  probably  more  glamour 
of  daring  to  his  Roman  audience  than  it  deserved. 


26  the  original  element  [ch. 

3.    Military  life 

Debellare  superbos. 

Vergil. 

Plautus  during  his  lifetime  witnessed  the  whole  of  the 
second  Punic  war.  It  was  a  war  which  had  come  almost 
to  the  gates  of  Rome,  and  which,  by  reason  of  its  length 
and  its  fierceness,  and  the  issues  which  it  involved,  made 
a  far  greater  impression  on  the  Romans  than  any  other 
conflict  in  their  whole  history.  It  opened  the  mind  of  a 
people  already  warlike  to  wider  ideas  and  more  determined 
ambitions.  Every  Roman  was  a  thorough  soldier  at  heart, 
and  in  his  amusements  as  well  as  in  his  sterner  occupations, 
anything  of  a  military  flavour  was  sure  to  make  a  welcome 
appeal. 

This  accounts  in  one  way  for  the  prominence  of  things 
mihtary  in  the  plays  of  Plautus.  It  must  however  be 
remembered  that  a  certain  warlike  tendency  was  a  heritage 
which  came  to  the  Roman  stage  along  with  many  other 
features  from  the  New  Comedy.  The  old  plays  too  were 
written  in  an  age  which  rivalled  the  period  of  the  Carthaginian 
conflict  in  the  "pride,  pomp  and  circumstance  of  glorious 
war,"  and  probably  in  the  years  following  the  death  of 
Alexander,  war  was  as  much  a  necessity  of  thought  as  it 
has  been  at  any  time.  It  seems  impossible,  however,  that 
a  man  of  such  tremendous  creative  and  energising  power 
as  Plautus  should  not  have  infused  into  his  comedies  some- 
thing of  the  warlike  strength  and  fervour  of  the  men  around 
him,  something,  in  fact,  of  the  vitality  of  his  own  experience. 

The  character  which  comes  first  to  one's  mind  in  con- 
sidering this  aspect  of  the  Plautine  comedy  is  Pyrgopolinices, 
in  the  Miles  Gloriosus.     This  play,  as  we  learn  from  1.  86, 


II]  MILITARY  LIFE  27 

is  founded  on  the  W\a^cov  of  a  Greek  poet  now  unknown 
to  us. 

^  aXa^oveia,  says  Theophrastus,  8ofet  elvai  irpoG'Troir)ai<^ 
Ti<;  dyaOwv  ou/c  cvtoji/,  6  8e  dXa^wv  rotovT6<;  ti<;,  ot09-.. 
avvoSoiTTopou  8e  diroXavcrai  ev  rf}  oBcp  BeLvo^i,  Xeycov,  &)?  fxer 
WXe^dvBpov  earparevaaro,  fcal  OTrct)?  avro)  €i')(^e,  Kal  ocra 
XidoKoWrjTa  irorrjpia  €K6iJii(T€.,./cal  ravra  (f)rjcrai,  ouSafjLOV 
€fc   Tpj<;  TToXeci)?   n7roB€B7)/jLr]Koo<i. 

Deforme  est,  says  Cicero,  de  se  ijosum  praedtcare,  falsa 
praesertim,  et  aim  irrisione  audientium  imitari  militem 
gloriosum. 

"I  am  a  rogue/'  says  Falstai!,  "if  I  were  not  at  half- 
sword  with  a  dozen  of  them  two  hours  together.  I  have 
'scaped  by  miracle.  I  am  eight  times  thrust  through  the 
doublet,  four  through  the  hose ;  my  buckler  cut  through  and 
through ;  my  sword  hacked  like  a  hand-saw — ecce  signum.'' 

From  this,  even  if  our  own  experience  failed  us,  we  might 
conclude  that  the  character  exploited  by  Plautus  in  this 
play  is  universal  rather  than  particular,  and  we  should 
hesitate  to  assert  that  Pyrgopolinices  was  essentially  Greek 
or  essentially  Roman.  It  is  quite  obvious  that  he  is  not 
mechanically  hfted  out  of  a  foreign  play.  He  breathes  a 
life  of  his  own,  which  has  made  him  one  of  the  most  famous 
characters  in  all  literature.  He  is  childishly  stupid  and 
almost  incredibly  vain,  and  somehow  all  his  characteristics 
are  stamped  with  a  Roman  die.  He  calls  on  Mars,  and 
talks  of  his  legiones  and  the  hostile  peditasfeUi:  he  wears 
a  clupeus,  a  circular  iron  shield  adopted  by  the  Romans  from 
the  Etruscans.  His  conversation  in  the  first  scene  with,  the 
fawning  parasite  Artotrogus,  brings  out  his  inordinate  conceit 
in  full  measure :    the  parasite  recalls  his  friend's  glorious 


28  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

conflicts  in  Cilicia,  in  Scytholatronia,  and  other  strange 
places,  and  the  thirty  men  of  Sardis,  and  the  sixty  of  Mace- 
donia, whom  he  slew  in  one  day.  "  How  many  altogether?  " 
enquires  Pyrgopolinices.  "  Seven  thousand,"  stoutly  answers 
his  ally — a  method  of  arithmetic  shared  by  Livy  and  the 
modern  press. 

The  mihtary  atmosphere  infects  the  other  characters  of 
the  play.  The  wise  and  old  Periplectomenus  lays  his  plans 
(1.  219)  against  the  7niles  as  a  general  schemes  his  campaign, 
bidding  his  comrades  lead  round  their  army  by  a  pass, 
besiege  the  enemy,  cut  off  his  suppHes,  and  guard  the  road 
which  their  own  A.S.C.  is  to  pass  along. 

The  play  abounds  in  stray  technicahties  taken  from  the 
Roman  military  system,  e.g.  Palaestrio  in  1.  815 — si  centuriati 
bene  sunt  manwplares  mei,  and  1.  266 — ad  eum  uineam  plicteos- 
que  agam,  just  as  the  Great  War  has  almost  led  some  of  us 
to  think  of  ordinary  things  in  terms  of  platoons  and  counter- 
attacks. 

Other  plays  of  Plautus  contain  milites  gloriosi  of  smaller 
fame.  Very  similar  to  our  last  hero  is  Stratophanes  in  the 
Tfuculentus,  who  proudly  and  bluntly  assures  us  that  his 
prowess  is  executed  in  deeds  rather  than  assumed  in  wordy 
harangues  to  a  bored  audience,  and  who  roars  out  a  playful 
enquiry  whether  his  supposed  newly-born  son  has  yet  joined 
his  legion  and  brought  back  from  war  the  spoils  of  victory. 
This  soldier  too  fights  under  the  kind  auspices  of  Mars. 
Other  characters  of  the  same  type  are  Polymachaeroplagides 
(Pseudolus),  Antamoenides  (Poenulus),  Thempontigonus  Pla- 
tagidorus  (Ciircvlio),  Cleomachus  (Bacchides)  and  Stratippocles 
(Epidicus).  All  these  people  produce  records  of  glorious 
achievement   as    long    as    their    highly   suggestive    names. 


n]  MILITARY   LIFE  29 

Much  as  we  ridicule  their  small  faults  and  foibles,  we  feel 
that  Plautus  treats  them  as  Shakespeare  treats  Falstaff, 
with  a  very  human  sympathy,  because  probably  he  had 
known  a  great  many  of  them  personally,  and  hailed  them 
as  his  brothers. 

We  find  the  mihtary  element  just  as  strong,  but  differ- 
ently presented,  in  the  Amphitruo.  The  Greek  origin  of 
this  story  is  obvious,  and  has  been  already  discussed.  The 
point  that  concerns  us  here  is  that  Amphitruo  himself  is  a 
thoroughly  Roman  general.  In  particular,  Sosia's  account 
of  his  campaign  against  the  Teleboans,  beginning  1.  188, 

Uictores  uictis  hostihus  legiones  reueniunt  domum, 
is  most  remarkably  Roman  in  style.  Indeed,  one  is  tempted  to 
postulate  a  family-tree,  beginning  with  an  unknown  ancestor, 
from  whom  are  descended  the  whole  of  Livy  and  this  Httle 
piece  of  Plautus.  The  passage  is,  even  in  details,  extra- 
ordinarily Livian.  For  the  use  of  cavalry  at  the  end  of  a 
battle,  we  may  compare  the  tactics  of  Tarquin  at  the  end  of 
the  Sabine  war,  Li\^  i.  37.  The  flentes  principes  of  Plautus 
recall  the  crestfallen  Samnites  of  Livy  ix.  45,  to  whom, 
suppliciier  agentihus,  the  Romans  granted  peace:  such  a 
frame  of  mind  in  an  enemy  was  one  in  which  Rome  took  a 
pecuHar  and  widely  expressed  dehght.  The  slave  Sosia 
follows  his  master  in  all  things  with  great  zeal  and  an  in- 
exhaustible treasury  of  humour.  Impera,  imperimn  exse- 
quar  (1.  956)  is  his  obHging  attitude.  The  legio  figures 
largely  in  his  conversation,  and  when  the  blows  of  Mercury 
rain  upon  his  hapless  person,  his  thoughts  turn  instinctively 
to  the  formahties  of  peace-making.  He  must  have  been  a 
tjrpical  mihtary  servant;  probably  the  generals  who  fought 
against  Hannibal  were  very  familiar  with  the  blessings  and 


30  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

discomforts  which  accrued  from  the  type.  The  whole  play- 
is  absolutely  Roman  in  tone,  largely  because  the  miUtary 
atmosphere  is  so  thoroughly  Roman  in  detail.  In  such  a 
character,  the  Amphitruo  stands  alone  among  the  plays  of 
Plautus. 

It  is  not  only  in  the  official  mihtary  circles  of  the  Plautine 
w^orld  that  we  find  the  martial  element.  There  is  no  rdle 
which  his  intriguing  slaves  more  love  to  adopt  in  the  prose- 
cution of  their  schemes  than  that  of  a  renowned  and  parti- 
cularly successful  general.  The  rascal,  whose  every  morrow 
may  bring  the  scourge  or  the  scaffold,  faces  the  world  quite 
unabashed,  and  dreams  the  greatest  of  all  Roman  dreams, 
the  Hfe  of  a  general.  This  seems  to  be  a  peculiarly  Roman 
trait.  Even  if  the  original  Greek  held  the  germ  of  the  idea, 
Plautus,  we  may  fairly  urge,  amphfied  it,  and  by  a  consistent 
use  of  Roman  mihtary  technicalities,  gave  it  a  thoroughly 
Roman  flavour. 

Pseudolus  is  perhaps  the  best  example.  He  plans  his 
campaign  (1.  574  seq.)  according  to  his  lights,  and  though  his 
nebulous  course  of  action  would  make  the  expert  gasp,  his 
enthusiasm  is  worthy  of  the  great  maiores  whom  the  Roman 
slave  can  own  only  in  fancy.  He  closes  with  the  enemy,  then 
invests  their  city,  after  this  brings  up  his  legions  and  sets 
them  forth  in  array  for  battle :  then  he  proceeds  to  divide 
the  spoils,  and  sees  as  in  a  vision  that  the  glory  of  his  deeds 
will  never  die.  In  this  we  are  reminded  of  the  pecuhar  ideas 
of  mediaeval  warfare  entertained  by  the  dreaming  hero  in 
the  second  act  of  "When  knights  were  bold." 

Of  all  the  Plautine  slaves  who  had  need  of  skilled  tactics 
to  extricate  them  from  the  direst  consequences  of  their 
intriguing,  none  was  in  a  more  urgent  phght  than  the  cele- 


Il]  MILITARY  LIFE  31 

brated  Tranio  in  the  Mostellaria.  Indeed,  after  he  has  "led 
out  his  legions/'  and  "withdrawn  his  maniples  to  safety/' 
he  feels  compelled,  hke  many  a  sorely-tried  consul,  to  call 
an  imaginary  senate,  from  which  he  sees  himself  summarily 
ejected,  and  reduced  to  the  devices  of  a  turbulent  and  incon- 
sequent mob.  Stasimiis  in  the  Trinummus  appears  as  a 
mihtary  servant  who  finds  it  advisable  to  abandon  his  present 
mode  of  hfe.  Non  sisti  potest — "things  are  past  mending  " — 
is  his  verdict  and  he  decides  to  take  up  his  knapsack  and 
buckle  on  his  shield,  and  depart  to  other  scenes  of  action. 

The  following  are  examples  of  the  numerous  Roman 
mihtary  technicahties  scattered  through  the  ordinary  con- 
versation of  Plautus:  imperator  (Capt.  307,  Ps.  1171),  trium- 
phus  (Ps.  1051),  adscriptiui  (Men.  183),  manuplares  (Most.  312, 
1048,  True.  491),  muniplatim  (Ps.  181),  uelitatio  (Rud.  525), 
dilectus  (Rud.  1279),  p'o  infrequente  militia  (True.  230), 
concent uriare  (Trin.  1002,  Ps.  572,  Cure.  585),  stipendium 
(Epid.  38,  Most.  131),  conlatis  signis  (Cas.  352),  eastra 
(Epid.  381),  moenia  (Rud.  692),  weapons  and  engines  such 
as  hallista,  catapulta,  aries  (Capt.  796,  Pers.  28,  Trin.  668), 
claiiator  (Rud.  804). 

It  is  instructive  to  note  that  Greek  mihtary  technicahties 
figure  in  our  author  hardly  at  all.  There  is  the  maehaera 
curiously  attributed  to  Pyrgopolinices  in  the  Miles  Gloriosus, 
and  appearing  again  Ps.  735.  The  word  strategus  appears 
occasionally,  e.g.  Stick.  702  and  Cure.  285,  and  stratioticus , 
e.g.  Ps.  918;  but  these  are  of  interest  as  illustrating  the 
introduction  of  Greek  words  into  the  ordinary  Latin  language, 
rather  than  from  the  military  point  of  view. 


32  the  original  element  [ch. 

4.    Politics  and  legal  customs 

Suppose  I  take  a  spurt,  and  mix 
Amang  the  wilds  o'  politics. 
Electors  and  elected. 

Burns. 

Ill  trying  to  ascertain  the  original  element  in  Plautus 
under  this  heading,  we  find  ourselves  upon  somewhat  difficult 
ground.     It  is  true  that  the  Roman  mind  ran  always  in  a 
legal  groove.     From  the  evolution  of  the  Twelve  Tables 
down  to  the  illustrious  jurists  of  the  later  Empire  the  stream 
of  Roman  law  continued  in  a  perfectly  steady  course.     Legal 
formalities  regulated  the  ordinary  life  of  the  people  at  every 
turn,  and  legal  formulae  were  on  their  Hps  in  even  the  most 
ordinary  conversation.     Law  was  to  them  an  ever-living 
interest,  and  it  appears  quite  natural  and  characteristic  that 
this  trait  should  be  prominent  in  Roman  comedy  such  as 
that  of  Plautus.     At  the  same  time  it  must  be  remembered 
that  the  Greeks  too  possessed  this  interest  in  law  to  a  very 
marked  degree.     Philodeon  of  the  Wasps  was  not  so  unique 
in  his  bent  as  his  slave  might  lead  us  to  suppose^.     There 
was  perhaps  this  difference  between  the  nations,  that  while 
the  average   Greek   was   absorbed  in   the   particular   legal 
problem  of  the  moment,  the  Roman  created  and  constructed 
forms  and  institutions  which  should  carry  on   all  future 
generations.     Rome  was  more  conscious  of  her  permanent 
value,  and  worked  not  only  for  the  immediate  to-morrow, 
but  even  for  the  far-off  and  hardly  suspected  barbarians 
who  were  to  deem  it  their  greatest  glory  to  deck  themselves 
in  some  shreds  of  her  purple. 

^  1.  88,  (f>i\T]Xia<rTris  iariv   las  ov8f\s  dvfjp. 


Il]  LEGAL  CUSTOMS  33 

Probably  political  thought  figured  less  largely  in  the 
New  Comedy  (which  was  domestic,  and  had  a  narrower 
outlook)  than  in  Plautus.  Nevertheless,  to  a  certain  extent 
the  legal  and  political  formulae  of  the  Roman  writer  are 
mere  translations  from  the  Greek.  Most  of  his  praetors, 
for  instance,  were  probably  in  the  beginning  archons,  and 
although  their  new  name  has  a  Roman  impUcation,  we 
cannot  on  that  account  attribute  originahty  to  Plautus. 
It  is  unusually  difficult  to  know  exactly  where  to  draw^  the 
hue  in  this  matter,  and  although  the  long  hst  of  Roman 
technicalities  about  to  be  detailed  are  in  themselves  very 
suggestive,  the  fact  of  translation  must  be  borne  in  mind, 
and  a  certain  reserve  exercised  in  assigning  to  Plautus 
original  thought  in  this  respect. 

In  reading  Plautus  we  nm  through  practically  the  whole 
gamut  of  magistrates  who  took  upon  themselves  care  for 
the  well-being  of  Rome.  There  are  two  notable  exceptions 
— the  consul  and  the  censor  are  never  mentioned.  Perhaps 
their  honourable  station  was  felt  to  be  above  the  flippancy 
of  comedy ;  perhaps  they  were  mentioned  in  plays  now  lost, 
and  the  merest  chance  has  robbed  us  of  references  to  them. 
Their  colleagues  appear  in  formidable  array.  There  is 
mention  of  a  dictator  (Ps.  416,  Trin.  695),  while  in  Pers.  770 
the  fascinating  Lemniselenis  is  called  a  dictatrix;  praetor 
(very  frequently,  e.g.  Capt.  450,  505,  Merc.  664) ;  tribimus 
(humorously,  Pers.  22);  quaestor  (Bacch.  1075);  aedilis 
(Capt.  823,  Pers.  160;  True.  557,  where  they  are  called 
puhlici,  the  officials  responsible  for  the  cleanhness  of  the 
city;  Rud.  373,  where  Neptune,  in  his  capacity  of  ship- 
wrecker,  is  referred  to  as  a  discriminating  aedile) ;  tresuiri, 
who,  as  the  overseers  of  prisons  and  of  punishments  generally, 

W.  B.  3 


34  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

are  made  much  of,  as  a  natural  consequence  of  the  usual 
trend  of  plot  in  Plautus  (Amph.  155,  Asin.  131,  Pers.  72, 
Aul.  416);  hkewise  their  attendant  lictores  {Asin.  575,  the 
octo  ualidi  of  Amjph.  160) ;  and  the  reciperatores,  a  board  for 
summary  trial  especially  in  cases  concerning  property  {Rud. 
1282,  Bacch.  270).  Moreover,  the  term  praefectura  occurs 
(Capt.  907,  Cas.  99),  and  prouincia,  as  a  magistrate's  sphere 
of  administration,  is  very  common  (e.g.  Capt.  4:7 i,  M.  G. 
1159,  Cas.  103).  None  of  these  officials  figure  as  persons 
in  the  drama.  They  are  passing  references  and,  in  a  way, 
extraordinarily  remote  from  the  men  of  the  same  titles  who 
swayed  the  fierce  political  emotions  of  the  Rome  of  that  day. 
They  are  names  whose  utterance  instigated  no  man  to  sing 
an  election  song  or  to  stab  his  rival  voter  at  the  poll.  The 
police  regulations  already  referred  to  are  probably  responsible 
for  their  sojourn  in  a  calmer  sphere. 

The  word  senatus  is  found  quite  frequently,  but  it  gener- 
ally bears  the  rather  vague  connotation  of  "consultation," 
e.g.  Epid.  159,  iam  senatum  conuocabo  in  corde  consiliarium 
(cf.  Asin.  871,  Aul.  549).  In  M.  G.  594,  Periplectomenus, 
pursuing  his  designs  against  the  miles,  sees  the  possibihty 
of  calling  afrequens  senatus  of  his  supporters,  and  at  the  close 
of  the  scene  hastens  to  meet  it,  ne,  dum  ahsmn,  illis  sortitus 
fuat.  This  latter  phrase  is  an  allusion  to  the  sortitio  prouin- 
ciarum  of  the  Roman  senate ;  as  the  provinces  were  allotted 
to  the  different  magistrates,  so  at  the  coming  conference  there 
would  be  assigned  to  each  character  his  or  her  part  in  over- 
reaching the  victim.  In  Cas.  536  Cleustrata  refers  ironically 
to  her  husband  as  the  senatus  columen,  and  the  phrase  recurs 
Epid.  189. 

The  Captiui  provides  an  allusion  to  the  comitia  tributa 


Il]  LEGAL  CUSTOMS  35 

(1.  476)  and  the  comitia  centuriata  (1.  155,  in  the  phrase 
iraperare  exercitiim).  The  latter  body  also  appears  speci- 
fically in  Ps.  1232.  The  common  remark,  uttered,  for 
instance,  by  the  petrified  Diniarchus  {True.  819),  meo  illic 
nunc  sunt  cajyiti  comitia,  seems  to  be  a  colloquial  expression 
for  the  verge  of  a  catastrophe.  In  Ps.  748  we  find  the  word 
plebiscitum. 

Judicial  matters  figure  largely  in  these  plays.  In  the 
Poenulus  and  the  Rudens,  for  example,  a  good  deal  of  the 
plot  turns  on  legal  actions,  but  as  far  as  details  go,  the 
processes  seem  to  be  more  or  less  common  to  Greece  and 
Eome.  Equivalent  to  the  aduocati  who  are  characters  in 
the  former  play  and  mentioned  in  the  latter  (1.  890),  the 
Greeks  had  fc\7]rijpe<;  (e.g.  Wasps,  1408),  the  witnesses  who 
gave  evidence  that  the  summons  had  been  served.  They 
correspond  exactly  to  the  phrase  licet  antestari  which  saved 
Horace  from  his  celebrated  dilemma  on  the  Sacred  Way^. 
In  fact  this  very  word  antestari  occurs  Pers.  lil  and  Cure. 
62 1 .  Other  ways  of  summoning  an  opponent  are  found  in  Rud. 
718  (te  ego  appello,  tecum  ago)  and  Asin.  480  (in  ius  uoco  te). 

Other  judicial  phrases  in  Plautus  are :   rem  facesso  [Rud. 

1061,   "I  am  a  plaintiff") ;    in  ius  rapiam  exsulem  {Rud. 

859,  meaning  an  act  of   ejectment,  i^ovXri^   SUt));    uades 

(Pers.  289,  cf.  Aul.  319) ;  iure  factum  iudico  (M.  G.  1435) ; 

diem  dicam  (Capt.  494);    ubi  res  prolatae  sunt  (Capt.  78, 

"when  business  is  adjourned");   [uenter  gutturque]  resident 

[essurialis]  ferias  (Capt.  468,  cf.  feriae  residentur  in  Cic.  Leg. 

n.  xxii.  55).     In  Pers.  143  the  word  decuria,  properly  a  board 

of  judges,  is  used  in  jocular  fashion  for  a  circle  of  boon 

companions. 

1  Sat.  I.  ix.  76. 

3—2 


36  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

The  formalities  of  colonisation  are  twice  mentioned. 
Epidicus  in  a  flight  of  metaphor  talks  (1.  343)  of  carrying 
provisions  into  his  colony  imder  his  own  auspices ;  and  the 
enraged  Simo  {Ps.  1100)  threatens  to  make  Pseudolus  give 
his  name  to  the  colony  of  Molae,  i.e.  the  millstones  which 
were  often  driven  by  dehnquent  slaves. 

The  phrase  sine  sacris  hereditas  (Cajot.  116,  Trin.  484) 
was  a  Roman  proverb  for  "  a  rose  without  a  thorn."  Roman 
estates  were  so  often  encumbered  with  rehgious  dues  that 
an  estate  not  so  vexed  was  a  singularly  lucky  windfall. 
Sacra  priuata  perpetua  manento  was  a  provision  of  the  Twelve 
Tables. 

Other  legal  terms  found  are:  usu  fecisti  tuom  (Aynpli. 
375),  scriptiira  (the  tax  paid  on  pubhc  pastures.  True.  144), 
tuas  res  tibi  hoheto  (the  injunction  of  a  husband  to  the  wife 
he  is  divorcing,  Trin.  266,  cf.  Amph.  928),  and  ciuis  immunis 
(a  citizen  exempt  from  the  payment  of  taxes,  Trin.  350). 

So  thoroughly  has  Plautus  Romanised  this  section  of  his 
world,  that  only  the  rarest  traces  are  left  of  unmistakably 
Greek  institutions.  Besides  agoranomi  (clerks  of  the  market, 
Capt.  824,  Cure.  285)  and  demarchi  (presidents  of  the  demos, 
Cure.  286)  there  is  the  magister  curiae  of  Aul.  107,  who  must 
really  represent  the  rptTTvdpxn'^,  for  such  distributions  as 
are  here  described  were  for  long  common  in  Greece,  but  not 
in  Rome  before  the  Empire.  In  Cist.  100,  there  is  a  reference 
to  the  Athenian  law  that  the  nearest  kinsman  of  an  orphan 
heiress  (rj  iiriKXrjpo^;)  should  be  obhged  to  marry  her;  thus 
Selenium  is  in  despair  that  her  lover  Alcesimarchus  will 
needs  take  to  wife  his  kinswoman,  sua  cognata  Lemniensis. 
The  word  crvyypa^rj  in  Demosthenes  and  other  Greek  writers 
means  a  written  bond,  and  as  syngraphus  it  has  this  meaning 


n]  SOCIAL  LIFE  37 

in  Asin.  238,  746;  in  Cap.  450,  506,  it  appears  to  mean  a 
passport.  Probably  it  is  another  illustration  of  the  incor- 
poration of  Greek  words  into  the  Latin  language,  and  is  to 
be  considered  as  interesting  chiefly  from  the  linguistic  point 
of  view. 

On  the  whole  we  may  conclude  that  when  Plautus  met 
in  his ,  originals  any  legal  institutions  differing  profoundly 
from  those  at  Home,  he  discarded  them.  Of  things  that 
presented  themselves  to  him  as  more  normal,  he  gave  a 
rough  approximation,  necessarily  ignoring  the  subtle  dis- 
tinctions which  mean  so  much  to  the  modern  student  of 
antiquities.  A  further  element,  again,  he  probably  added 
without  the  aid  of  extraneous  suggestion,  and  thus  clothed 
an  old  world  anew  in  the  associations  habitual  to  his  gene- 
ration. 

5.    Social  life 

I  met  a  hundred  men  on  the  road  to  Delhi,  and  they  were  all  my 
brothers.     Punjab  proverb. 

Everything  that  Plautus  has  incorporated  into  his  plays 
from  the  everyday  life  of  Rome  has  a  particular  value  in  the 
reckoning  of  his  originahty,  for  this  is  an  element  which  is 
hkely  to  be  more  subtle  and  spontaneous  than  any  other, 
and  therefore  to  possess  a  suggestiveness  of  its  own.  Every 
stage  of  man's  life,  as  it  was  Uved  at  Rome,  from  the  cradle 
to  the  grave,  is  represented  in  scattered  examples  in  these 
plays,  and  these  Roman  instances  far  outnumber  the  few 
social  features  which  are  characteristically  Greek. 

"At  first  the  infant...."  Juppiter,  taking  an  opportune 
farewell  of  Alcmena  before  the  return  of  Amphitrvx)  from  the 
Avars,  says  to  her,  referring  to  the  child  about  to  be  born  to 


38  THE  ORIGUsTAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

them,  quod  erit  natum,  tollito  {Amph.  501).  This  recalls 
the  Roman  custom  of  laying  the  new-born  child  at  its  father's 
feet,  so  that  he  could  signify  his  intention  of  rearing  it  by 
Itaking  it  up  from  the  ground;  otherwise  the  infant  was 
exposed.  Juppiter  here  deputes  his  function  to  the  mother, 
but  in  True.  399,  Phronesium  speaks  as  a  mother  intending 
to  "raise"  her  child  by  her  own  choice,  the  father  being 
absent  and  therefore  unable  to  have  a  voice  in  the  matter. 

Pursuing  the  child's  hfe  to  the  dies  lustricus,  we  find 
{True.  424)  a  remarkable  Grecism  in  the  phrase  quinto  die. 
The  j&fth  day  after  the  child  was  born  was  in  Cxreece  that 
appointed  for  it  to  receive  its  name,  to  the  accompaniment 
of  rehgious  sacrifices.  In  Rome,  according  to  Plutarch, 
this  took  place  on  the  eighth  day  if  the  child  were  a  girl, 
on  the  ninth  if  a  boy. 

With  the  bulla,  however,  of  Rud.  1171  and  Cure.  612,  we 
return  to  Roman  customs.  This  was  a  kind  of  amulet, 
of  gold  if  pecuniary  circumstances  permitted,  otherwise  of 
leather.  It  was  in  origin  an  imitation  of  an  ornament  worn 
by  the  old  Etruscan  kings,  and  it  was  hung  round  the  child's 
neck  to  preserve  it  from  the  influence  of  magic  (fascinatio). 
Every  Roman  child  was  thought  to  be  threatened  by  all 
kinds  of  evils  from  the  numberless  divinities,  vague,  petty, 
and  mostly  terrible,  which  formed  his  divine  environment. 
Ovid  describes  many  old  charms  for  keeping  these  beings 
from  the  cradles  of  children^. 

Concerning  the  Roman  ceremony  of  marriage,  the  Casina 
is  the  most  fruitful  play  for  details.  There  we  read  (1.  86) 
of  the  auspices  which  had  to  accompany  the  ceremony,  and 
of  the  bridegroom  attired  in  white  (eandidatus,  1.  446).     Of 

1  Fastiy  VI.  105  seq. 


Il]  SOCIAL   LIFE  39 

the  bride's  attire  Plautus  touches  on  only  one  detail,  namely 
the  binding  of  the  hair  into  the  sex  crines,  or  six  plaited  locks, 
tnatronarum  modo  (M.  G.  791,  Most.  226).  The  importance 
of  the  dowry  in  the  contract  is  illustrated  by  the  dilemma  of 
Leshonicics  (Trin.  689),  who  is  oppressed  by  the  apparent 
impossibility  of  giving  his  dowerless  sister  in  marriage  to 
his  friend.  Looking  a  little  ahead,  the  still  greater  import- 
ance of  the  dotata  uxor,  when  her  position  and  influence  have 
been  strengthened  by  time,  is  commented  on  with  feeling 
in  Most.  703  seq.  The  wedding-supper  {cena),  which  was 
usually  prepared  by  the  father  of  the  bride,  is  in  the  Aulu- 
laria.  the  province  of  the  bridegroom,  a  fact  which  causes 
surprise  to  at  least  one  character  of  the  play,  but  is  explained 
by  the  apparent  poverty  of  the  bride's  family.  Similar 
hospitality  is  offered  by  the  bridegroom  Phaedromus  in  Cure. 
728,  evidently  for  no  reason  except  his  own  exuberant 
spirits.  The  Casina  mentions  the  fluteplayers  (1.  798)  and 
the  torchbearers  (1.  118)  who  accompanied  the  marriage 
procession  to  the  bridegroom's  house,  and  (1.  815)  introduces 
the  famous  lifting  of  the  bride  over  the  threshold  (sensim 
super  attolle  limen  jiedes,  nou/x  nupta),  which  was  either  a 
reminiscence  of  the  forcible  wooings  of  old  times,  or  an  in- 
surance against  the  bad  omen  which  would  occur  if  the 
bride  were  to  stumble  at  the  entrance  to  her  new  home. 
Such  at  least  are  the  explanations  offered  by  Plutarch  in 
his  Aetia  Ronuina,  and  it  is  obvious  that  a  Roman  custom 
which  thus  elicited  surprise  and  speculation  from  a  Greek 
was  foreign  to  the  social  habits  by  which  that  Greek  was 
surrounded. 

Plutarch  again,  in  the  same  enquiries  into  the  customs 
of  the  Romans^  wonders  why  Roman  husbands  sent  their 


40  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEME?s"T  [CH. 

wives  word  in  advance  of  their  return  to  town  from  the 
country  or  from  abroad.  This  remarkable  act  of  courtesy 
and  consideration  occurs,  be  it  observed,  in  the  Stichus 
and  the  Ainphitruo;  but  as  it  is  not  unknown  to  Greek 
manners  (witness  the  return  of  Heracles  to  .  Deianeira  in 
Sophocles)  and  to  the  amenities  of  modern  society,  we 
hesitate  to  draw  any  conclusion  except  that  Plutarch  in 
this  matter  has  been  somewhat  more  futile  than  usual. 

The  houses  in  Plautus  are  mostly  built  on  an  indifferent 
plan,  though  the  Roman  construction  of  the  house  of  Peri- 
plectomenus  is  an  important  element  in  the  Miles  Gloriosus. 
Round  the  impluuium  (1.  159)  of  this  house,  i.e.  the  opening 
in  the  roof  of  the  atrium,  the  entrance  for  the  rain  from  above 
(hence  the  name)  and  the  exit  for  the  smoke  from  below, 
revolves  the  main  plot  of  the  story,  and  as  Greek  houses 
never  had  impluuia,  this  must  be  a  Roman  house,  albeit 
built  at  Ephesus.  It  would  be  interesting  to  know  what 
element  there  was  in  the  Greek  original  of  the  story,  for  which 
this  highly  important  structure  has  been  substituted.  It 
occurs  again  Amph.  1108.  The  uestihulum  and  pleasant 
amhulacrum,  which  were  a  feature  of  many  Roman  houses, 
appear  Most.  756,  and  remind  one  of  Vergil's  playful  adap- 
tation of  it  when  he  planned  a  habitation  for  his  bees^, 
whose  institutions  were  to  be  such  a  splendid  copy  of  all 
that  was  best  in  Rome, 

palmaque  uestihulum  aut  ingens  oleaster  inumbref. 
Associated  with  the  entrance  to  the  house  is  the  atriensis, 
a  dignitary  who  is  found  several  times  in  Plautus  (e.g.  Ps. 
609),  and  had  no  exact  Greek  equivalent  (he  differed  con- 
siderably from  the  oIkovoijlo^). 

1  Oeorgics,  iv.  20. 


n]  SOCIAL  LIFE  41 

The  raising  of  Roman  houses  to  several  storeys  is  referred 
to  in  Am  ph.  863,  where  Juppiter  jocosely  announces  that 
he  lives  in  an  elevated  attic  {in  superiore  cenaculo).  Such 
a  modest  abode  was  later  commended  by  pTuvenal  as  being 
immune  from  the  raids  of  Nero's  soldiers. 

Finally,  the  parasite,  in  the  fragment  of  the  play  called 
Boeotia  (which  is  attributed  to  Plautus,  though  not  included 
in  Varro's  hst),  speaks  of  the  city  being  filled  with  sundials 
(solaria).  These  in  Plant  us'  day  would  be  something  of  a 
novelty,  for  according  to  Salmasius  the  first  sundial  in  Rome 
appeared  in  254  B.C.,  the  year  of  Plautus'  birth.  The  parasite 
is  probably  meant  to  be  an  elder  contemporary  of  Plautus, 
for  he  remembers  with  loving  regret  the  good  old  days  when 
mealtimes  were  regulated  by  the  call  of  appetite,  and  not  by  the 
artificial  and  unaccommodating  means  in  vogue  at  a  later  day. 

One  feature  of  a  Greek  house  occurs  in  a  certain  type  of 
key^  the  clauis  Laconica  of  Most.  404,  It  does  not  seem  to 
have  been  adopted  at  Rome,  but  it  is  mentioned  by  Aristo- 
phanes (Thesm.  423)  from  whom  we  learn  that  it  had  several 
wards  (rpei?  e^oi'Ta  <yofi<biov^). 

In  the  matter  of  dress,  the  characters  of  Plautus  are 
torn  between  Greek  and  Roman  fashions.  It  is  remarkable 
that  the  toga  is  nowhere  specifically  mentioned,  though  the 
phrase  qui  uestitu  et  creta  occultant  sese  (Aid.  719)  seems  to 
refer  to  the  popular  method  of  "dry-cleaning"  the  toga  with 
chalk.  The  other  important  constituent  of  male  attire,  the 
tunica,  occurs  very  frequently  (e.g.  M.  G.  688,  Aul.  647). 
"With  regard  to  head-covering  there  is  the  pilleus,  which  was 
shared  by  the  Romans  with  the  Etruscans  and  Umbrians, 
appearing  as  the  symbol  of  liberty  (Amph.  462)  and  as  the 
cap  of  a  sailor  [Pers.  155).     The  petasus  was  worn  by  genera- 


42  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

tions  of  celebrities,  both  Greek  and  Roman,  from  Hermes  to 
Augustus^  and  is  not  missing  in  Plautus  (Ampli.  143,  Ps.  734). 
The  paenula,  or  cloak,  is  often  found  (e.g.  Most.  991). 
Women,  as  far  as  they  are  clad  in  Roman  fashion,  wear  the 
palla  (AuL  168,  Alen.  426).  A  most  interesting  diatribe  on 
the  unnecessary  intricacies  of  ladies'  attire  occurs  Epid.  225, 
where  Epidicus  himself  discourses  with  contumely  on  their 
square-bordered  dresses  (called  impluuiata  from  their  supposed 
resemblance  to  the  impluuium,  a  homely  derivation  paralleled 
by  peg-top  skirts,  leg  of  mutton  sleeves,  and  bell-bottomed 
trousers),  their  blue  kerchiefs,  their  gold  edgings,  their  grand 
mantillas,  and  the  infinite  variety  of  weavings  in  all  their 
materials.  This  passage  has  already  been  considered  from 
an  historical  point  of  view. 

Of  Greek  dress,  frequent  mention  is  made  of  the  chlamys, 
the  broad  woollen  upper  garment  used  especially  for  a  military 
cloak  {Cure.  611,  M.  G.  1423)  but  also  worn  by  children 
(Merc.  912),  and  of  the  pallium,,  a  mantle  favoured  particu- 
larly by  Greek  philosophers,  and  worn  by  Romans  only  when 
they  resided  among  Greeks  {Epid.  1,  Meii.  658). 

In  the  scenes  of  Plautus  where  feasting  occurs,  the  Roman 
audience  must  have  felt  thoroughly  at  home.  The  repre- 
hensible practice  (followed  in  a  later  generation  by  Juvenal's 
consul  Marius)  of  beginning  the  evening  meal  betimes  in  the 
afternoon,  is  mentioned  Asin.  826  {de  die  potare).  The 
tricliniunt  seems  to  figure  largely  at  these  revels.  Thus 
Epignomus  {Stick.  487)  announces  that  he  is  having  nine 
guests  (the  normal  number  for  a  Roman  host)  to  dinner, 
and  the  parasite  Gelasimus  (1.  493)  modestly  assigns  to  him- 
self the  place  of  lowest  honour.     Grumio  in  the  Mostellaria 

1  Suet.  Oct.  82. 


II]  SOCIAL  LIFE  43 

(1.  43)  is  equally  humble  in  the  allotment  of  places  at  table, 
but  in  the  festivities  which  conclude  the  Persa,  Sagaristio 
is  bidden  to  take  the  highest  place  {accumhere  in  suriwio, 
1.  767).  The  couches  at  table  in  the  Stichus  are  made  of 
gold  (hke  Juhus  Caesar's,  according  to  Suetonius)  and  of 
ivory  (like  some  recorded  by  Varro).  Prehminary  attentions 
on  the  part  of  the  slaves,  such  as  reheving  the  guests  of  their 
shoes  {True.  367)  and  bringing  water  for  their  hands  (Pers, 
769)  are  also  found.  We  get  several  glimpses  into  the  drink- 
ing-bouts which  crowned  the  Roman  feast.  In  Pers.  821 
the  attendant  is  told  to  carry  round  the  wine  (in  Asin.  891 
he  is  specifically  ordered  to  begin  with  the  guest  of  highest 
honour),  and  Toxilus  (1.  773)  toasts  his  mistress  with  the 
set  phrase  bene  tihi,  handing  her  his  cup  (ut  amantem  amanti 
decet).  It  is  interesting  to  learn  from  Cicero  and  other 
writers  that  the  Romans  rather  prided  themselves  on  drink- 
ing "in  the  Greek  manner"  {more  Graeco):  but  the  Greeks, 
at  any  rate  of  the  best  age,  succeeded,  by  the  intellectual 
trend  of  their  conversation,  and  by  the  exclusion  of  women 
from  their  table,  in  preserving  a  function  of  more  restraint 
and  no  less  sociability  than  the  orgies  which  were  the  pre- 
vaihng  fashion  at  Rome. 

From  drinking  vre  pass  to  gambhng,  the  uetita  legibus  alea, 
as  Horace  called  it.  There  is  an  interesting  reference  to 
this  ban  (which  was  removed  under  the  Empire),  in  M.  G. 
164,  where  Periplectomeniis  warns  his  slaves  to  keep  an  eye  on 
the  invaders  of  his  house,  lest,  by  playing  dice  {tali,  a  pun  on 
its  meaning  of  "  knuckle-bones")  at  table,  they  should  trespass 
against  the  Roman  law  {ne  legi  fraitdem  faciant  aleariae). 

The  tablets  of  wax,  which  were  in  common  use  at  Rome 
for  writing  purposes,  until  they  were  superseded  by  the 


44  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

introduction  of  papyrus,  are  mentioned  Ps.  31,  401,  Bacch. 
441 ;  in  the  last  instance  they  appear  as  the  defensive 
weapons  with  which  the  seven  year  old  schoolboy  warded  ofE 
the  irate  approaches  of  his  paedagogus.  The  stili,  the  pointed 
instruments  by  which  the  wax  was  inscribed,  are  referred  to 
jocularly  by  Pseudolus  (1.  545)  who  anticipates  punishment 
in  a  metaphor  of  this  sort,  stilis  me  totum  usque  ulmeis  con- 
scribito. 

Turning  to  the  less  strictly  domestic  side  of  Roman  Hfe, 
we  observe  the  very  large  number  of  times  in  which  mention 
is  made  of  the  term  patronus,  both  in  a  technical  sense  and 
in  the  more  general  meaning  of  "kind  and  helpful  friend" 
{e.g.  Rud.  705,  906,  Cas.  759,  3Iost.  407,  Pers.  838).  The 
word  rex  meaning  "patron"  is  found  Capt.  92  and  Stick.  445, 
and  recurs  in  Juvenal^  for  the  historic  glutton  who  dined 
in  sohtary  state  off  "the  choicest  dainties  of  land  and  sea." 
The  most  important  passage  in  this  respect  is  Men.  571-601, 
where  the  first  Menaechmus  laments  the  irresistible  impulse 
which  sets  every  man  of  wealth  to  collect  as  many  "chents" 
as  possible ;  whether  they  were  good  or  bad,  poor  or  well  to 
do,  it  mattered  nothing,  so  long  as  he  had  a  larger  retinue 
of  dependents  than  had  his  neighbours ;  and  he  continually 
paid  the  price  for  his  vanity  by  having  to  extricate  his  chents 
from  the  clutches  of  the  lawcourt  or  the  comitia  when,  by 
their  excessive  prochvity  to  perjury  and  usury,  they  found 
themselves  in  difficulties  beyond  their  power  to  escape. 

The  parasite  was  a  stock  character  in  the  New  Comedy. 
He  was  a  hanger-on  with  a  view  to  being  invited  out  to  dinner. 
He  was  transferred  to  the  Roman  imitations  of  Greek  comedy, 

^  Optima  siluarum  interea  pelagique  uorahit 
Bex  horum.  Sat.  i.  136. 


II]  SOCIAL  LIFE  45 

but,  as  it  is  known  that  by  the  days  of  Horace  the  edaces 
parasiti  were  prominent  and  well-established  characters  in 
the  actual  hfe  of  Rome,  there  is  sufficient  reason  to  suppose 
that  Plautus  saw  around  him  plenty  of  real  examples  who 
would  make  copy  for  his  ready  pen.  It  is  not  necessary  to 
assume,  for  instance,  that  Ergasilus  of  the  Captiui  was  a 
mechanical  reproduction  of  a  Greek  original ;  he  is  certainly 
a  type,  but  a  hving  type,  and,  as  a  Roman,  he  would  consider 
his  httle  Grecisms  a  dehberate  pohsh  and  refinement  natural 
to  the  high  Hfe  to  which  he  aspired.  His  dehrium  of  energy 
when  he  is  suddenly  appointed  ceUarius  for  the  arrangement  of 
Hegio's  banquet  takes  place  in  a  thoroughly  Roman  kitchen. 

A  characteristic  feature  of  Roman  hfe  is  found  in  the 
Stichus  (1.  195  seq,),  where  Gelasimus  holds  an  auction 
(aicctio),  posing  as  his  own  auctioneer,  and  carrying  out  in 
detail  all  the  httle  formahties  proper  to  such  an  occasion. 
Plautus  coiitains  other  references  to  this  mode  of  sale,  e.g. 
Bacch.  815  (ut  praeco  praedicat). 

Another  branch  of  finance,  namely  banking,  is  prominent 
in  Plautus.  Argentarii,  who  sound  genuinely  Roman,  are 
mentioned  (e.g.  Cure.  377)  but  far  more  frequently  the 
species  are  referred  to  as  tarpezitae  (e.g.  Trin.  425,  Capt.  193, 
Epid.  143),  which  was  the  technical  name  for  them  in  Greece. 
The  two  terms  appear  to  have  been  practically  equivalent, 
and  it  is  not  impossible  that  the  Greek  may  have  been 
adopted  into  daily  use  at  Rome.  There  is  just  the  possibihty 
of  a  curiously  Roman  detail  attached  to  the  argentarii  of  the 
Curculio,  for  there  Lyco  the  banker  signifies  his  intention  of 
having  recourse  to  the  praetor  in  the  event  of  his  chents 
being  difficult  to  deal  mth.  A  Roman  banker  was  subject 
to  the  superintendence  of  the  state  authorities,  and  could 


46  THE   ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

presumably  look  for  their  support  on  occasions  of  stress. 
In  Ps.  287,  and  often  elsewhere,  the  danista,  or  moneylender, 
has  a  distinctly  Greek  flavour. 

In  True.  136  the  sentence  nimis  otiosum  te  arhitror  hominem 
esse  recalls,  in  its  context,  an  interesting  episode  in  the  history 
of  Roman  social  life,  which  is  recorded  in  Livy  xxi.  63.  The 
historian  tells  of  a  law  passed  by  a  tribune  and  supported 
by  C.  Flaminius,  forbidding  senators  as  a  class  to  engage 
in  speculative  ventures  in  foreign  trade.  They  were  allowed 
to  transport  the  produce  of  their  own  estates,  but  not 
to  enrich  themselves  by  commercial  deahngs  in  the  pro- 
vinces or  elsewhere,  following  the  principle,  quaestus  omnis 
patribus  indecorus  uisus.  The  law  was  extremely  unpopular 
with  senators,  and  comment  upon  it  extended  even  to  the 
comic  stage. 

There  are  passing  references  to  gladiatorial  shows,  which 
of  course  were  not  so  prominent  in  Roman  life  of  Plautus' 
day  as  they  became  under  the  Empire.  Thus  the  palus 
{Ricd.  1290)  is  the  gladiator's  sword  of  w^ood,  and  the  phrase 
in  statu  stat  senex  (M.  G.  1839)  refers  to  the  defensive  attitude 
of  the  gladiator  before  the  contest  begins. 

Among  the  few  general  reflections  in  these  plays  upon 
the  state  of  contemporary  society,  none  is  more  striking 
than  Megadorus^  discourse  (Trin.  199)  beginning  nihil  est 
profecto  stultius.  This  passage  tallies  so  remarkably  with 
what  we  learn  from  St  Paul  and  others  of  the  character  of 
Athens,  that  we  must  assign  it  to  the  original  Greek  play: 
but  if  the  Roman  audience  observed  the  cap  to  fit  elsewhere, 
Plautus  doubtless  would  have  been  not  uncontent. 

Coming  at  last  to  "the  lean  and  slippered  pantaloon," 
we  are  confronted  with  the  melancholy  subject  of  legacy- 


Il]  SOCIAL   LIFE  47 

hunting.  The  methods  of  this  practically  acknowledged 
profession  are  displayed  at  length  and  with  great  clearness  by 
the  aged  Peripkcto7mnus  in  M.  G.  705  seq.  All  that  Horace 
and  Juvenal  have  to  say  of  the  Romans'  feverish  quest  for 
the  favour  of  their  rich  and  childless  old  men,  and  of  the  way 
in  which  the  victims  traded  on  these  attentions  for  their  own 
advantage,  is  here  corroborated  in  every  detail,  and  we 
reahse  that  PHny  was  far  from  making  an  original  discovery 
in  his  estimation  of  childlessness,  orhitas  in  aiMtoritate  summa. 
Death  is  naturally  not  a  large  element  in  Plautine  comedy, 
and  references  to  its  ceremonies  are  very  scarce.  Tntc.  231 
and  Bacch.  884  alludes  to  the  naenia,  or  Roman  funeral  song, 
and  in  the  former  play  (1.  495)  there  is  mentioned  the  jyraefica, 
or  hired  mourner,  who  recalls  Statins'  description  of  the 
function  of  the  professional  weepers,  qui  non  sua  funera 
plorant. 

As  every  play  of  Plautus  contains  at  least  one  slave  in  its' 
cast,  a  picture  of  slave  life  necessarily  fills  a  large  part  of 
the  canvas,  and  it  is  interesting  to  see  to  what  a  great  extent 
this  is  Roman  rather  than  Greek.  The  play  which  is  most 
important  in  this  respect  is  the  Captiui,  in  which  no  fewer 
than  five  characters  are  either  temporarily  or  permanently 
in  the  position  of  slaves. 

The  treatment  accorded  to  a  Greek  slave  varied  with  the 
character  and  position  of  the  owner,  and  with  the  qualities 
and  value  of  the  slave.  The  slave  had  no  legal  rights,  but 
there  were  laws  which  protected  him  against  excessive 
cruelty  and  caprice,  and  it  was  usually  open  to  him,  when  he 
considered  that  his  ill-treatment  had  gone  far  enough,  to 
take  refuge  in  a  temple  and  claim  to  be  sold  to  another 


48  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

master.  The  Eoman  slave,  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  belonged 
absolutely  to  his  master,  who  could  torture  or  kill  him, 
compel  him  to  commit  any  moral  or  immoral  action,  and 
even  cast  him  out  in  his  old  age  after  long  years  of  service. 

Thus  in  the  Captiui,  when  we  see  Stalagmiis  at  his  final 
exit  accepting  his  due  of  fetters  with  a  grim  "smallest  con- 
tributions thankfully  received,"  we  conclude  that  his  lot  was 
cast  in  genuinely  Roman  places.  Tyndarus,  bound  in  chains 
and  sent  to  work  in  the  stone  quarries,  makes  us  pause  on 
remembering  that  the  Athenians  at  Syracuse  suffered  a 
similar  fate,  being,  Hke  Tyndarus,  alx^XwroL,  or  prisoners 
of  war.  Nevertheless,  such  treatment  was  anything  but 
alien  to  Roman  ideas,  and  the  innumerable  details  of  Roman 
I  slave  hfe  scattered  through  the  play,  support  the  conclusion 
'that  the  picture  harmonised  completely  with  the  ordinary 
hfe  of  Rome. 

Stalagmus  is  referred  to  as  Hegio^s  lepidum  mancipium, 
i.e.  purchased  slave,  a  phrase  (minus  the  adjective)  which 
occurs  very  frequently  in  Plautus  (e.g.  M.  G.  23,  Pers.  532, 
Trin.  421).  The  boy  who  complains  in  Act  iv.  of  the  ravages 
of  Ergasilus  in  the  kitchen,  seems  to  have  been  a  uenm, 
a  slave  born  in  the  household,  though  this  word  is  not 
actually  used,  as  it  is  in  Amph.  179.  The  lorarii  who  were 
set  to  scourge  the  dehnquent  slaves,  were  probably  fellow- 
slaves  of  the  victims.  Tyndarus  and  his  companion  were 
bought,  as  we  learn  from  the  prologue,  from  the  spoils  of 
victory  in  the  care  of  the  quaestors.  The  traffic  in  slaves  at 
Rome  was  recognised  as  rivalling  the  celebrated  trade  at 
Delos,  and  though  Ergasilus  (1.  98)  refers  to  it  indignantly  as 
a  quaestus  inhonestus,  we  learn  from  Plutarch^  that  even  the 

^  Cato  mai,  21. 


n]  SOCIAL  LIFE  49 

highly  respectable  Cato  put  money  into  these  questionable 
transactions.  Slaves  were  usually  sold  in  pubhc  markets, 
and  Seneca^,  corroborated  by  a  suggestion  in  Cure.  481, 
reports  that  they  were  also  sold  near  the  temple  of  Castor. 

To  return  to  the  Captmi.  When  Aristophontes  (1.  574) 
asks  Tyndarus,  qiteni  patrem  qui  servx)S  est?  he  recalls  the 
melancholy  fact  that  a  slave  had  no  parentage  in  the  eyes 
of  the  Roman  law.  This  imparts  a  tinge  of  humour  to 
Olympio's  boast  {Cas.  418)  that  the  success  of  his  side  in  the 
drawing  of  the  lots  was  due  to  his  own  pietas  and  to  that  of 
his  ancestors.  It  also  elucidates  the  sarcasm  of  Charmides 
{Trin.  1031)  in  attributing  to  his  slave  a  ynos  jnaiorum. 

Another  important  feature  in  the  position  of  Roman  slaves 
was  the  encouragement  given  them  by  their  masters  to  save 
their  own  money — peculium,  a  store  which  was  by  every  right 
their  own.  This  is  often  mentioned  in  Plautus  (e.g.  Asin. 
541,  Pers.  192,  Trin.  434),  while  from  Cas.  258  it  appears 
that  a  slave  who  had  neglected  his  opportunities  of  collecting 
this  was  regarded  as  particularly  lazy  and  contemptible. 

The  typical  Roman  law  that  the  misdeeds  of  one  slave 
should  involve  the  punishment  of  all  his  fellows,  is  referred 
to  in  M.  G.  408,  where  Pahestrio  entreats  his  colleague 
Sceledrus  not  to  invite  such  a  catastrophe. 

It  is  chiefly  in  these  lower  walks  of  hfe  that  we  find  the 
extraordinarily  rich  vocabulary  of  abuse  and  ill-will  for  which 
Plautus  is  so  justly  famous,  and  although  the  extant  frag- 
ments of  Menander  prove  that  this  was  a  feature  famihar 
to  the  Greek  tongue,  the  langua,ge  of  Plautus  is  too  spon- 
taneous and  hearty  to  represent  anjirhing  but  the  real 
Roman  life  of  his  day.     Uerbero  and  tnastigia  are  common 

1  ad  Seren.  13.  4. 
W.B.  4 


60  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

forms  of  address,  and  furcifer,  a  term  as  little  endearing, 
is  derived  from  the  furca,  a  heavy  forked  piece  of  wood 
placed  as  a  punishment  on  a  slave's  neck,  his  hands  being 
tied  to  the  two  ends.  The  number  of  forms  of  punishment 
and  torture  mentioned  in  Plautus,  and  borne  out  by  other 
Roman  authors,  is  almost  incredible;  there  are  the  catenae 
smgulariae,  or  light  fetters  {Capt.  112);  the  tunica  molesta, 
alluded  to  in  the  pix  atra  of  Capt.  597,  a  horrible  form  of 
burning  mentioned  also  by  Martial  and  Juvenal ;  the  pati- 
hulum  (M.  G.  360,  Most.  56),  or  forked  yoke,  mentioned  by 
Cato  for  its  more  merciful  function  of  propping  vines;  the 
columhar  (Rtid.  888),  a  torturing  collar,  so  called  from  its 
resemblance  to  a  hole  in  a  dove-cot ;  the  carnarium,  or  meat- 
rack,  diverted  to  more  personal  uses  (Ps.  198) ;  the  pistrinum, 
or  pounding- mill  (Bacch.  781);  uirgae  (rods)  and  stimulus 
(the  lash)  mentioned  very  frequently;  the  red-hot  plates 
(found  also  in  Horace^  and  Cicero^),  crosses,  fetters,  and 
many  other  afflictions  enumerated  in  Asin.  548  seq. ;  and 
the  practice  of  branding  the  word  FUR  (which  is  Roman) 
on  the  forehead  of  a  thief,  referred  to  in  the  phrase  trium 
litterarum  homo  of  Aul.  325. 

We  come  now  to  the  more  cheerful  theme  of  the  manu- 
mission of  slaves.  To  end  a  play  by  rewarding  a  faithful 
and  heroic  slave  with  freedom  was  the  Plautine  method  of 
'•Rving  happily  ever  afterwards."  The  phrase  manu  emittere 
occurs  times  without  number  (e.g.  Capt.  408,  713,  Rud.  1218, 
1388,  Asin.  411,  Cas.  284,  Most.  975),  and  adserere  manu  some- 
what  less  often  {Cure.  708).  The  uMicta  (Cure.  212)  and 
festuea  (M.  G.  961),  the  staff  with  which  the  slave  was  touched 
in  the  ceremony  of  manumission,  are  both  mentioned,  and 
1  E'p,  I.  XV.  36.  2  in  y^rr.  V.  63.  163. 


Il]  SOCIAL   LIFE  51 

the  fateful  words  of  the  master,  liher  esto,  are  found  Ejdd.  730, 
Meyi.  1149;  it  is  in  allusion  to  this  that  Sosia  at  the  end  of 
the  Amphitruo  says  to  his  lord  (1.  857)  aheo  si  tubes.  In  the 
same  play  there  occurs  the  phrase  capere  pilleum  (I.  462) 
meaning  the  felt  cap  which  was  given  a  slave  at  his  enfran- 
chisement as  a  sign  of  his  freedom. 

Nearly  all  the  Plautine  slaves  are  in  character  what  we 
are  accustomed  to  regard  as  Greek  (Tyndarus  of  the  Captiui 
is  an  exception  who  will  be  considered  later).  They  have 
a  distinct  resemblance  to  their  prototypes  in  Aristophanes 
and  Menander.  This  would  present  no  difficulty  in  the  face 
of  their  Roman  setting,  but  for  the  natural  presumption 
that  the  Graeculus  esuriens  did  not  come  to  Rome  in  any 
great  numbers  until  the  middle  of  the  second  century  B.C., 
so  that  it  is  questionable  whether  the  Greek  type  of  slave, 
versatile,  daring,  exuberant,  and  witty,  was  very  famiUar 
to  the  Rome  of  Plautus'  day.  There  are  however  accommo- 
dating factors  to  be  considered  in  this  problem.  Low  Kfe,  all 
the  world  over,  has  a  characteristic  wit,  and  the  Fescennine 
and  other  local  types  of  humour  prove  that  the  Italian  was 
not  behindhand  in  this  respect.  Moreover,  even  if  the 
Roman  slave  had  not  attached  to  him  quite  the  romance  and 
verve  which  formed  the  halo  of  the  Plautine  figure,  the 
latter  would  make  none  the  less  appeal  to  the  imagination 
of  an  audience  containing  a  large  proportion  of  plebeian 
hohday-makers.  These  in  their  moments  of  relaxation 
would  be  prepared  to  forget  the  stern  ideals  in  which  they 
had  been  educated  by  discreet  overlords,  and  to  accept  a 
character  somewhat  aUen  to  their  own  ideas  with  all  the 
greater  welcome  for  the  thoroughly  Roman  detail  of  the 
setting  in  which  he  was  placed.     The  Greek  slave  in  Plautus 

4—2 


52  THE   ORIGINAL   ELEMENT  [CH. 

had  not  the  slightest  tendency  to  make  the  drama  unnatural 
or  ill-considered  in  the  estimation  of  the  audience  for  which 
it  was  intended.  On  the  contrary,  this  slave  contributed 
so  much  to  the  play  in  which  he  was  placed,  that  he  became 
in  Rome  as  in  Greece  a  popular  necessity  to  the  drama, 
like  the  pantaloon  of  mediaeval  Venice;  so  much  so,  that 
when  Plautus  came  to  write  his  original  burlesque,  the 
Amphitruo,  he  had  to  insert  two  specimens,  one  (Mercury) 
very  ludicrously,  into  an  otherwise  unexpected  setting. 

It  is  not  only  in  Rome  itself,  but  in  the  remote  rural 
districts,  far  from  the  busy  scenes  of  city  hfe,  that  Plautus, 
the  native  of  the  northern  uplands,  finds  himself  at  home, 
with  ready  inspiration  for  hteral  use  and  for  metaphor  alike. 
Homely  proverbs  and  sayings  of  the  countryside  come  easily 
to  the  hps  of  his  characters,  such  as  sihi  quisque  ruri  metit 
(Most.  799)  said  pollucta  pago  ("  dish  for  the  \'illage,"  Rud.  424). 
A  picturesque  metaphor  from  country  hfe  occurs  in  Trin.  317, 
where  the  dutiful  son  Lysiteles  assures  his  father  that  he  has 
always  kept  his  commands  "in  good  repair"  [sarta  tecta, 
a  proverbial  phrase,  originally  legal,  connected  with  the 
censor's  duties),  and  the  old  man,  pursuing  the  homely 
image,  tersely  bids  him  see  that  the  rain  does  not  come 
through  on  this  particular  occasion.  From  similar  associa- 
tions we  find  the  infuriated  Hegio  (Capt.  661)  addressing 
Tyndarus  as  sator  sartor  que  scelerum  et  messor  rnaxwme,  "  the 
consummate  sower  and  hoer  and  reaper  of  mischief,"  and 
the  irrepressible  slave  reminds  him  that  he  has  omitted  the 
harrower  (occator)  from  his  catalogue,  forgetting  that  country 
folk  always  harrow  before  they  hoe.  Plautus  further  makes 
mention  of  sculponeae  (Cas.  495),  a  rustic  type  of  wooden 


II]  SOCIAL  LIFE  53 

shoe,  clitellarii  [yniili]  (Most.  780),  mules  for  carrying  pack- 
saddles,  both  of  which  terms  are  found  in  Cato,  a  fact 
which  is  of  itself  surety  for  their  genuine  ItaUan  origin. 

Among  the  wild  animals  of  Italian  hfe,  a  certain  interest 
is  attached  to  the  Iwpus  essuriens  of  Capt.  912  and  Stick.  605. 
Where  the  Roman  talked  of  the  wolf  for  fierceness  and 
rapacity,  the  Greek  preferred  the  Hon.  Thus  the  Platonic 
Socrates  in  the  first  book  of  the  Republic,  says  ol€l  yap 
av  fie  ovTco  fiavrjvaL  co(TT6  ^vpelv  €7rf^€i,peiv  Xeovra  Kai 
avKO(j}avT€tv  Spaav/Jiaxov ;  Vergil,  however,  in  most  of  his 
similes,  substituted  the  ItaUan  wolf  for  the  Homeric  hon, 
and  it  is  a  curious  fact  estabhshed  by  numismatists  that  the 
farther  west  one  travels,  the  more  unfamihar  and  astonishing 
are  the  delineations  of  Rons  on  ancient  coins.  The  fox, 
of  course,  is  not  peculiar  to  Italy,  but  the  saying  tarn  facile 
uinces  qicam  pirum  uolpes  comest  {Most.  559)  has  the  ring  of 
an  ItaUan  country  proverb. 

For  birds  we  find  the  kite  (Rud.  1124)  and  the  vulture 
(uolttirio  plus  hmnani  est,  M.  G.  1044).  The  latter  seems 
to  have  been  a  ready  simile  to  the  Roman  mind;  Cicero, 
for  instance,  referred  to  Verres  as  the  uolturius  prouincim. 

This  forms  a  kind  of  complement  to  what  has  already 
been  said  about  the  interest  taken  by  the  Romans  of  Plautus' 
day  in  Italy.  It  was  only  a  rudimentary  feeUng,  hardly 
comparable  with  the  spell  which  the  rivers  and  mountains 
and  plains  of  Italy  exercised  on  later  minds  such  as  Vergil 
or  even  Lucretius.  It  is  better  paralleled  by  the  little 
touches  like  the  "smale  fowles"  that  "maken  melodye," 
which  brings  parts  of  the  Canterbury  Taks  under  the  magic 
of  the  English  countryside,  far  removed  from  the  France  and 
Italy  of  their  origin.     The  writers  of  the  New  Comedy  are 


64  THE   ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

represented  by  many  fragmentary  eulogies  of  country  life, 
for  instance,  the  following  from   Menander's  v^pla — 

&)9  rjBv  Tcp  fJLKTOvvri,  Toix;  (f)av\ov<;  rpoirov^i 

ipTj/jbla,  K.T.X. 
but  they  praise  it  almost  exclusively  for  the  peace  and  soH- 
tude  which  their  imagination  makes  sympathetic  with  each 
sentimental  mood  of  the  moment.  Their  view  is  entirely 
romantic.  Plautus'  attitude  is  quite  different,  it  is  practical, 
natural,  and  real,  and  it  reveals  him  as  something  more 
than  an  uninterested  machine  for  converting  the  plays  of 
the  New  Comedy  into  his  own  tongue. 

Closely  related  to  this  consideration  of  the  social  aspect 
of  Roman  life,  are  Plautus'  references  to  the  theatre,  on  the 
practical  as  well  as  on  the  literary  side.  From  the  prologue 
to  the  Atnphitruo  we  learn  a  good  deal  about  the  packing 
of  audiences  with  paid  applauders  (fauitores)  and  the  punish- 
ment of  bad  actors,  but  this  may  not  be  accounted  to  the 
credit  of  Plautus,  as  the  references  in  the  passage  to  seated 
spectators  prove  it  to  be  post-Plautine.  In  the  play  itself 
the  poet  seems  to  have  in  mind  two  of  his  own  dramas, 
when  (1.  988  seq.)  Mercury  discourses  on  the  functions  of 
the  breathless  slave ;  the  phrase  naicem  saluam  nuntiat  may 
easily  recall  Pinacium  of  the  Stichus,  and  irati  aduentum 
senis  is  Tranio^s  tidings  of  the  return  of  Theopropides  in 
the  Mostellaria.  In  Bacch.  214  he  makes  an  interesting 
and  presumably  laudatory  allusion  to  his  Epidicus,  thereby 
dating  the  latter  play  with  fair  certainty  as  previous  to  the 
former:  and  in  Cas.  523  he  may  refer  to  his  own  play  the 
Colax  (now  lost)  or  to  that  of  Naevius,  but  in  any  case  the 
reading  of  the  text  is  doubtful. 


n]  SOCIAL  LIFE  56 

In  Trin.  858  there  is  a  mention  of  the  choragus,  the 
Roman  stage  official  who  had  charge  of  costumes  and  pro- 
perties generally,  and  was  thus  distinct  from  the  Greek  of 
the  same  title.  It  is  probably  the  same  character  who 
makes  the  remarkable  speech  already  noticed  in  Cure.  462  seq. 
(assuming  this  passage,  with  all  probabihty,  to  be  genuine). 
In  M.  G.  631  the  word  alhicapillus  refers  to  the  white  wigs 
which  it  was  the  custom  of  actors  impersonating  old  men  to 
wear  upon  the  comic  stage. 

Thus  far  the  theatrical  allusions  may  be  reckoned  original 
to  Plautus ;  but  the  question  has  another  side.  In  Rud.  86 
he  makes  a  somewhat  grotesque  allusion  to  the  Alcmena  of 
Euripides,  using  it  as  a  simile  for  a  tempestuous  wind.  After 
perusing  the  Atnphitruo  we  conclude  that  this  may  be  honest 
proof  of  personal  acquaintance  with  the  play.  The  reference 
alone,  however,  does  not  presuppose  this,  for  Menander 
{Epitr.  585)  alludes  to  and  quotes  from  another  play  of 
Euripides,  the  Auge,  and  this  suggests  that  the  original  Tnqpa 
of  Diphilus  may  have  referred  to  Euripides  too.  In  Most, 
1149  Plautus  refers  to  Philemon  and  Diphilus  in  a  way 
natural  to  a  Greek  rather  than  to  a  Roman,  and  hence  pro- 
bably translated  from  his  original. 

In  considering  this  matter  we  must  remember  the 
numerous  references  found  in  Plautus  to  the  characters  of 
Greek  legend  and  drama.  They  are  most  prominent  perhaps 
in  the  Menaechmi  (Calchas,  the  Titans,  Ulysses,  Nestor, 
Ganymede  and  Porthaon),  and  Chrysalus'  lengthy  account 
of  the  fall  of  Troy  in  Bacch.  900  seq.  is  another  striking 
instance ;  most  plays  contain  at  least  one  or  two  such  names, 
though  they  are  curiously  absent  from  the  Ampliitruo.  As 
Menander  too  has  the  same  characteristic  {Epitr.  110,  PeUas 


56  THE   ORIGIJSTAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

and  Neleus;  Sam.  122,  Helen,  245,  Zeus  and  the  shower  of 
gold)  we  may  assign  the  Plautine  allusions  whole-heartedly 
to  the  Greek  original,  but  with  this  reservation,  that  in  plays 
so  essentially  popular  they  must  have  been  already  to  some 
extent  naturalised  to  Roman  thought  in  order  to  be  accepted 
at  all. 

6.    Keligion 

Nicht  Rosen  bloss,  auch  Dornen  hat  der  Himmel. 

Schiller. 

If  the  rehgion  of  Plautus  was  acceptable  to  the  people 
before  which  it  appeared,  and  there  are  no  grounds  for  be- 
Heving  otherwise,  the  picture  which  we  have  here  of  popular 
religious  usages  and  beUefs  of  the  second  century  B.C.  is  of 
great  value.  From  its  spontaneity,  and  the  fact  of  its 
incorporation  into  the  ordinary  things  of  hfe,  it  teaches  us 
more  of  Roman  religion  than  the  passionate  disbehefs  of 
Lucretius  or  all  the  antiquarian  learning  of  Varro.  Poly  bins, 
who  hved  in  this  century  and  knew  Rome  well,  said  that  it 
was  the  scrupulous  fear  of  the  gods  which  kept  the  Roman 
commonwealth  together  (o-vvexeLv  rd  'PofiaLcov  irpdy^iara), 
and  this  is  true  both  of  the  official  behefs  which  controlled 
their  general  poHtics,  and  of  the  more  personal  creeds,  spring- 
ing from  the  thousand  and  one  divinities  which  guided  or 
misguided  the  life  of  the  individual  Roman.  In  the  rehgion 
of  the  Plautine  comedies  we  expect  to  find  a  blending  of  Greek 
and  Roman,  but  the  comparatively  simple  eUmination  of  the 
exclusively  Greek  element  shows  pretty  clearly  what  by  way 
of  rehgious  doctrine  the  ordinary  Roman,  such  as  Plautus,  had 
to  hve  on  in  that  day.  We  must  remember  the  fact  of  comic 
Ucense,  and  not  treat  Plautus  more  seriously  than  he  treated 


II]  RELIGION  57 

his  own  plays.     With  this  reservation,  the  enquiry  is  profit- 
able. 

First  we  will  enumerate  certain  Plautine  deities  who  were 
the  most  prominently  accepted  in  Roman  worship,  and  have 
a  counterpart  in  the  pantheon  of  Greece.  An  almost  com- 
plete catalogue  of  them  is  found  in  Bacch.  892-5 — 

ita  me  Inpjnter,  luno,  Ceres, 
Minerua,  Lato,  Spes,  Opis,  UiHus,  Uenus, 
Castor,  Polluces,  Mars,  Mercurius,  Hercules, 
Summanus,  Sol,  Saturnus,  diqite  mnne^  ament. 

Most  of  these,  mth  the  addition  of  others,  recur  else- 
where: lujrpiter  (most  frequently,  e.g.  Capt.  426,  768, 
M.  G.  331,  1082,  this  last  passage  refers  to  his  origin  as  the 
son  of  Ojys);  Imio  (Cas.  408,  and,  as  materfamilias,  Amph. 
831) ;  Mars  (Bacch.  847,  M.  G.  1384,  True.  656 :  in  this  last 
passage  he  is  associated  with  the  wolf  and  thus  with  the  old 
story  of  the  founding  of  Rome) ;  Uenus  (M.  G.  1384,  Men. 
371,  Ps.  15;  Rud.  694,  where  she  has  her  favourite  epithet 
ahna):  Neptunus  [Trin.  820,  Stich.  403,  where  he  is  the  col- 
league of  the  deified  storms);  Liber  [Capt.  578,  Cas.  640, 
Cure.  98,  114);  Uolcanus  [Amph.  341,  Bacch.  255);  Apollo 
(Aul.  394,  where  he  appears  in  his  rather  typically  Greek 
character  of  aXe^UaKo^,  though  the  institution  of  the  ludi 
Apollinares  in  the  crisis  of  the  second  Punic  war  [212  B.C.] 
probably  rendered  this  aspect  of  him  famihar  at  Rome); 
Mercurius  (St.  274);  Aesculapius  (Cure);  Bellona  (Bacch. 
847) ;  Lucina  (True.  476) ;  Nerio  (the  wife  of  Mars ;  a  Sabine 
word,  hke  Nero,  signifying  bravery;  True.  515);  Lauerna 
(goddess  of  thieves,  Aul.  445,  frag,  of  the  Cormeula) ;  Siluanus 
(Aul.  674) ;  and  Summanus  (the  equivalent  of  Pluto,  Cure. 
412).     In  Epnd.  610  a  reference  is  made  collectively  to  the 


68  THE  ORIGINAL   ELEMENT  [CH. 

undecim  deos  plus  Juppiter  himself,  i.e.  the  "twelve  gods" 
enumerated  by  Ennius^. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  with  this  side  of  Roman 
rehgion  the  Menandrian  theology  in  so  far  as  the  extant 
fragments  allow  it  to  be  formulated.  It  includes  Zeus, 
Heracles,  Poseidon,  Apollo,  Aphrodite,  Demeter,  Athena, 
Dionysus,  Asclepius,  Hephaestus,  and  Adrasteia.  Moreover, 
the  "twelve  gods"  reappear  in  ol  BaSeKa  deoi  of  Sam.  91, 
and  seem  to  be  identical  with  the  similar  company  of  Arist. 
Birds,  96.  By  the  time  of  the  New  Comedy  the  Olympian 
hierarchy  in  Greece  had  fallen  for  ever  from  its  old  estate, 
and  on  the  stage  it  seems  to  be  little  more  than  a  literary 
survival.  The  gods  are  useful  as  ejaculations  and  expletives, 
and  as  the  pivots  of  mythology,  but  they  have  no  motive 
power  in  the  evolution  of  a  dramatic  plot.  Their  counterparts 
in  Plautus'  world  were  on  a  rather  different  footing.  Their 
splendour  was  still  an  object  of  worship,  their  caprice  a  cause 
for  fear:  but  in  Plautus  as  in  Menander  they  are  totally 
free  from  responsibihty  for  the  course  of  mortal  affairs.  Mars 
is  the  patron  of  Pyrgopolinices  on  the  battlefield,  but  he  does 
nothing  to  protect  him  from  the  assaults  of  his  enemies  in 
the  jousts  of  love.  Venus,  again,  from  her  imminent  temple, 
surveys  all  the  actual  intricacies  and  possible  catastrophes 
which  make  up  the  plot  of  the  Rudens',  but  though  her 
priestess  administers  material  consolation  to  the  ship- 
wrecked heroines,  the  goddess  herself  makes  no  effort  to 
disentangle  matters,  nor,  be  it  noted,  is  she  once  requested 
to  do  so. 

In  the  Afnphitruo  the  detached  way  in  which  all  the 

^         luno,  Uesta,  Ceres,  Deiana,  Minervxi,   JJenus,  Mars, 
Mercurius,  loui,  Neptunus,  Uolcanus,  Apollo. 


RELIGION  59 


n] 

characters  regard  the  Olympian  hierarchy,  is  especially 
amusing  in  view  of  the  fact  that  among  the  persons  of  the 
drama  are  Juppiter  and  Mercury.  Juppiter  is  a  common 
ejaculation,  falhng  even  from  his  own  Hps,  and  Hercules, 
we  observe,  is  copiously  sworn  by  before  he  is  born.  But 
this  play  stands  apart  from  the  rest,  and  must  not  be  taken 
as  typical. 

In  trying  therefore  to  sort  out  the  Greek  from  the  Roman 
in  this  matter,  we  may  be  content  to  leave  this  aspect  of 
rehgion  on  common  ground,  and  pursue  our  search  for  the 
Roman  element  in  another  direction. 

The  well-established  personages  already  mentioned  form 
only  one  section  of  the  imposing  array  of  di\dnities  found 
in  the  pages  of  Plautus.  It  has  been  said  that  all  deities 
that  man  can  devise  have  a  right  in  the  pantheon  of  a  poly- 
theistic rehgion,  and  Plautus,  perhaps  to  a  degree  more  than 
his  contemporaries,  far  more  than  Menander,  as  far  as  we 
can  tell,  takes  full  advantage  of  the  fact ;  but  this  is  a  question 
of  comic  Hcense  as  well  as  of  theology. 

The  first  of  these  supernumeraries  is  Fortuna.  As  Tvxv 
she  appears  in  Menander ;  indeed,  she  was  originally  a  pro- 
duct of  the  Hellenistic  age,  when,  after  the  collapse  of  the 
orthodox  rehgion,  the  need  was  felt  for  some  more  or  less 
personal  di\dnity  who  could  be  held  responsible  for  the 
extraordinary  phenomena  of  success  and  catastrophe  which 
marked  the  post-Alexandrine  period.  She  was,  however, 
well  estabhshed  at  Rome  by  the  end  of  the  third  century. 
There  were  temples  to  Fortuna  Respiciens  on  the  EsquiUne 
and  the  Palatine,  and  this  aspect  of  the  goddess  is  referred 
to  in  the  play  on  words  in  Capt.  834.  She  is  alluded  to  in 
passing  as  evil  (mala)  by  the  infuriated  Lahrax  of  Rud.  501, 


60  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

and  as  good  (bona)  in  Aul.  100,  where  the  absurd  wariness 
of  the  miser  Euclio  is  displayed  by  his  teUing  his  maidservant 
that  even  if  this  beneficent  deity  comes  to  his  door,  she  is, 
along  with  borrowing  neighbours  and  other  undesirables, 
to  be  refused  admittance.  Pseudolus  in  a  single  passage 
(679  seq.)  attributes  the  success  of  his  intrigues  to  the  kindli- 
ness of  Fortune.  In  Asin.  716  seq.  the  infinite  capabihties 
of  a  favouring  Fortune  are  questioned  by  a  despairing  lover. 
She  is  referred  to  again  in  Pers.  515.  In  not  one  of  these 
passages  is  Fortune  referred  to  in  any  sense  as  the  moving 
deity  of  the  play.  She  is  just  a  passing  allusion,  and  events 
take  their  course  without  any  reference  to  her  pleasure  or 
displeasure.  This  fact  we  may  take  as  a  simple  inheritance 
from  the  New  Comedy,  which  had  discarded  the  problems 
of  Aeschylus  in  the  same  way  as  Plautus  omitted  to  anticipate 
Vergil. 

We  come  now  to  the  enormous  array  of  minor  deities, 
some  common  to  Roman  thought  of  the  time,  others  coined 
by  Plautus  for  a  comic  purpose,  especially  for  the  rapturous 
effusions  of  lovers  to  their  ladies.  The  follov/ing  are  ex- 
amples: Salus  {Capt.  864,  Asin.  713,  Bacch.  879;  in  a 
non-comic  rdle  of  representing  the  welfare  of  the  Roman 
people,  this  deity  had  a  temple  on  the  Quirinal) ;  Safuritas 
{Capt.  877,  the  appropriate  god  for  a  hungry  parasite) ;  Lux, 
Laetitia,  Gaudium  {Capt.  864) ;  Lihertas  {Rud.  489) ;  Lubentia 
{Asin.  268);  Pietas  {Asin.  506,  Bacch.  1176,  Ps.  280,  Cure. 
471);  Amor,  Uoluptas,  Uenustas  {Bacch.  115);  Luna,  Sol, 
Dies  {Bacch.  255) ;  Munditia  {Cas.  225) ;  Ignauia  {Ps.  850) ; 
Opportunitas  {Ps.  669) ;  Spes  {Ps.  709) ;  Honor  {Trin.  663) ; 
Fides  {Aul.  583) ;  Saluhritas  (frag,  of  the  Cornicula) ;  and 
locus,    Ludus,    Sermo,    Suauisuauiatio    {Bacch.    116).     The 


II]  BELIGION  61 

pseudo-deification  of  such  qualities  is  largely  Roman,  even 
largely  Plautine.  Such  elasticity  of  ideas  in  the  matter, 
especially  for  humorous  purposes,  was  never  equalled,  as  far 
as  we  know,  on  the  other  side  of  the  Adriatic,  and  Terence 
is  practically  untouched  by  it.  One  point  must  be  noticed 
in  this  connection :  the  prologue  to  the  Trinummm  is  spoken 
by  Luxuria  and  Inopia,  and  is  thus  paralleled  by  the  pro- 
logue to  Menander's  Feriheiromem,  which  is  spoken  by  the 
goddess  " X'yvoia. 

A  particularly  Roman  thought  in  the  Plautine  theology 
is  that  of  the  Genius.     This  was,  as  Servius  explains,  "the 
natural  god  of  each  individual  thing  or  place  or  man,"  and 
it  becomes  perhaps  best  known  in  Roman  history  when  the 
Genius  of  Augustus  comes  to  be  worshipped  all  over  the 
Roman  Empire.     The  general  idea  is  not  limited  to  Italy. 
It  is  also  Oriental,  and  recurs,  for  instance,  in  the  "fravashi" 
of  Persia.     But  this   name,   with  its   definite   conception, 
is  quite  Roman,  and  there  does  not  seem  to  have  been  any- 
thing quite  Hke  it  in  Greece.     In  Plautus  it  occurs  most 
frequently  in  the  Captiui.     Thus  Philocrates  describes  to 
Hegio  how  his  fellow-captive's  supposed  father  sacrificed  to 
his  Genius  with  vessels  of  the  cheapest  earthenware,  lest  the 
god  should  be  tempted  to  lower  his  dignity  by  theft  of  more 
expensive  articles  (1.  290).     In  1.  879  Ergasilws  speaks  of 
Hegio's  son  as  his  own  Genius,  thus  putting  him  into  the 
most  sacred  and  endearing  relation  with  himself  (as  Curculio 
does  Phaedromus,  Cure.  301),  and  in  1.  977  Hegio,  desper- 
ately anxious  for  Philocrates  to  come  out  of  the  house, 
entreats  him  by  his  Genius,  as  being  perhaps  the  most 
precious  thing  he  could  bring  to  bear  on  the  subject.     Simi- 
larly Phaedromus  (Cure.  628)  swears  that  he  will  rescue  his 


62  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

mistress  Planesium  as  he  would  his  own  Genius,  i.e.  practi- 
cally his  own  soul.  Other  references  to  the  Genius  are  Men. 
138,  St.  622,  Aul.  725. 

Closely  associated  with  this,  to  the  mind  of  a  Roman, 
were  the  Lares,  and  these  too  figure  in  Plautus.  They  were 
perhaps  the  spirits  of  ancestors,  and  dwelt  in  every  household, 
little  twin  guardian  gods,  with  a  dog  at  their  feet.  They 
were  almost  indistinguishable  from  the  Penates,  and  their 
special  function  was  to  see  that  the  family  did  not  die  out. 
This  was  almost  the  only  part  of  Roman  rehgion  which  never 
became  obscured  by  Oriental  cults.  The  prologue  to  the 
Aulularia  is  spoken  by  the  Lar  of  the  household  of  Euclio, 
and  in  this  connection  we  may  note  that  the  prologue  to 
Menander's''H/>a)9  ©eo?  is  spoken  by  the  minor  deity  of  that 
name,  who  may  have  been  somewhat  akin  to  the  Lar  but  was 
certainly  not  identical  with  him.  There  is  a  curious  reference 
to  the  Roman  god  in  the  Mercator,  a  play  otherwise  uncoloured 
by  Roman  features.     In  1.  834  Charinus  addresses  the 

di  penates  meum  parentum,  familiai  Lar  pater 
in  farewell,  sa}'ing  that  he  will  leave  his  unsatisfying  ancestral 
home  and  find  for  himself  another  Lar  and  other  Penates.  It 
is  doubtful  whether  a  Roman,  mindful  of  the  founder  of  the 
Roman  state,  could  thus  hghtly  have  abandoned  the  guardians 
of  his  house  and  taken  to  himself  others.  {Palaestrio  [M.  G. 
1339]  in  bidding  farewell  to  his  Lar  familiaris ,  seems  to  enter- 
tain no  such  hope.)  This  seems  to  be  a  rough  approximation 
of  something  different  in  the  Greek.  Later  (1.  865)  Charinus 
invokes  the  Lares  Uiales  to  be  propitious  to  his  journey. 
The  Romans  frequently  had  shrines  to  Lares  at  cross-roads. 
Ovid^,  in  fact,  tells  that  in  the  time  of  Augustus  the  city  of 

1  Fasti,  V.  145. 


Il]  RELIGION  63 

Eome  alone  had  a  thousand.  Other  references  to  the  Lar 
are  Triyi.  39,  Rud.  1207. 

Other  specifically  Roman  spirits  mentioned  in  Plautus 
are  the  laruae,  ghosts,  the  souls  of  the  dead  who,  by  reason 
of  a  violent  or  unjust  death,  could  find  no  rest.  They 
usually  assumed  the  form  of  spectres  or  skeletons,  and  made 
a  hobby  of  striking  the  hving  with  madness.  It  is  thus 
that  Tyndarus  is  pleased  to  account  for  the  "delirium"  of 
Afistophontes  {laruae  stimulant  uirum,  Capt.  598),  and  the 
same  compliment  is  paid  to  Euclio  in  Aid.  642. 

Apart  from  this  superstition,  the  characters  of  Plautus 
regard  the  prospect  of  death  and  the  unknown  hereafter  with 
a  composure  which  is  good-humoured  where  it  is  not  actually 
comic.  They  appear  to  have  an  almost  geographical  con- 
ception of  a  region  called  Acheruns,  which  is  to  be  the  place 
of  their  considerable  activities  after  their  decease;  thus  it 
is  to  be  the  scene  of  the  posthumous  renown  of  Tyndarus 
(Capt.  689).  In  Cas.  448,  to  "send  a  man  to  Acheruns''' 
means  to  kill  him,  and  in  Poen.  71,  to  go  there  oneself  means 
to  die ;  and  twdce  (Merc.  290,  M.  G.  627)  a  man,  as  we  should 
say,  "^^th  one  foot  in  the  grave,  is  called  a  senex  Acherunticus. 
It  is  edifying  to  note  that  Acheron  is  used  to  denote  the 
future  life  by  Ennius,  and  that  Cicero  in  his  Tusculans 
quotes  the  sentence  adsum  atque  advenio  Acherunte  as 
coming  from  an  old  Roman  poet  whose  name  he  omits. 
Just  as  all  this  may  be  accounted  Roman,  so  may  the  per- 
sonaUty  who  appears  to  be  in  charge  of  this  not  necessarily 
dismal  region.  Orcus  was  recognised  by  Ennius  (Acherunsia 
templa  alta  Orci).  In  Plautus  it  was  Orcus  who  refused  to 
admit  to  his  domain  the  elderly  and  inefficient  cook  hired 
by  Ballio  (Ps.  795),  and  it  is  only  in  the  presence  of  Orcus 


64  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

(apud  Orcum)  that  Argyrippus,  at  one  stage  of  his  love- 
affair,  has  any  hope  of  seeing  again  his  beloved  Philaenium 
{Asin,  606).  Orcus  may  have  had  kinship  with  the  Greek 
Pluto,  but  at  least  his  name  was  new,  and  his  recognition 
at  Rome  took  place  at  a  very  early  date. 

The  attitude  of  Plautine  characters  towards  the  gods, 
as  far  as  it  is  expressed  in  general  terms,  is  partly  that  of 
appreciation,  partly  that  of  speculation  how  to  get  most  out 
of  the  gods  on  the  cheapest  terms.  Both  aspects  are  charac- 
teristically Roman.  Thus  in  the  Captiui,  Tyndarus  (1.  313) 
postulates  a  perfectly  just  deity  who  interests  himself  in  the 
affairs  of  men,  and  Hegio  {1.  324)  attributes  his  own  satis- 
factory wealth  to  the  kindness  of  the  gods  as  well  as  to  the 
discreet  behaviour  of  his  ancestors.  One  of  the  most  remark- 
able Roman  traits  in  the  Rudens  is  the  emphasis  on  the  virtue 
of  pietas  (e.g.  Palaestra  in  1.  192,  si  erga  parentem  aut  deos 
me  impiaui,  cf.  11.  26,  618).  The  value  of  this  quality  was 
an  idea  to  which  the  Romans  clung  with  an  ever-increasing 
tenacity.  Naevius  and  Ennius  praised  it.  Later,  the  sug- 
gestion that  it  was  the  corner-stone  of  the  Empire,  was 
made,  for  instance,  by  Vergil  and  Horace,  and  this  was  a 
"heathen"  notion  which  had  to  be  combated  even  by  such 
late  writers  as  Tertullian  and  Prudentius. 

On  the  other  hand  we  must  remember  that  Periplectomenus 
(M.G.  675,  if  we  may  cling  to  a  suspected  text)  was  confident 
that  any  amount  of  money  spent  on  service  to  the  gods 
balanced  in  his  favour,  and  similarly  Philolaches  (Most.  241) 
described  such  an  outlay  as  the  best  possible  investment  for 
any  man's  money. 

There  are  few  references  in  these  plays  to  sacred  festivals. 
The  Cereris  JJigiliae,  which  played  an  important  part  in  the 


II]  RELIGION  65 

story  preceding  the  action  of  the  Aulularia  (11.  36,  795)  demand 
attention.  The  cult  of  Ceres  was  introduced  into  Rome  in 
496  B.C.,  and  festivals  were  held  in  her  honour  every  April 
and  August.  But  they  were  naturally  the  direct  counterpart 
of  the  Greek  %e(Tfio(\)6pLa,  and  were  accompanied  by  similar 
Hcenses  and  abuses.  So  here  again  we  tread  on  ground 
common  to  Greece  and  Rome,  only,  in  the  context,  it  is 
perhaps  more  Greek  than  Roman.  The  Dionysia  of  Cist.  89 
were  replaced  in  Rome  by  the  Bacchanalia ;  here  we  can  but 
note  the  fact  that  Plautus  has  ignored  an  obvious  opportunity 
for  Romanisation.  The  Ludi  Olympii,  too,  of  Stick.  306, 
are  Greek. 

In  the  matter  of  Roman  sacrificial  ceremonies  there  is  to 
be  observed  the  sacrifice  to  the  Genius  already  mentioned 
(Capt.  861)  and  Amphitruo's  sacrifice  after  his  triumphant 
return  home  from  the  wars  (Amph.  946).  In  Epid.  146 
there  occurs  the  interesting  word  succidaneum,  which  is 
explained  by  Servius  in  a  note  on  Aeneid  ii.  140  as  the 
technical  term  used  at  Rome  for  the  second  victim  at  a 
sacrifice,  if  his  predecessor  had  by  some  mischance  irretriev- 
ably eluded  the  hand  of  the  priest.  Note  too  the  phrase 
inter  sacrum  saxumque  sto  {Capt.  617,  Cas.  970),  a  proverb 
for  a  perilous  situation,  hke  that  of  an  animal  for  sacrifice, 
between  the  altar  and  the  flint  knife  of  the  priest. 

Perhaps  the  most  typical  and  striking  feature  of  Roman 
rehgion  as  portrayed  in  Plautus  is  the  incessant  reference 
to  auspices  and  omens.  The  most  important  play  in  this 
respect  is  the  Casina,  by  reason  of  the  long  scene  (ii.  6),  in 
which  the  rival  lovers  draw  lots  for  the  favour  of  Casina 
herself.  It  is  true  that  the  title  of  the  Greek  original  of  this 
play_«;\7?/3ou/u6i/oi— suggests  that  Diphilus  too  had  intro- 


W.  E. 


66  THE  ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

duced  lots  of  some  kind  into  his  story;  yet  the  Plautine 
details,  the  jar  of  water,  the  lots  of  fir  and  poplar  wood,  and 
the  intense  care  taken  by  both  parties  for  the  avoidance  of 
bad  omens,  tally  so  singularly  with  what  Cicero  tells  of  Roman 
divination,  that  the  scene  seems  to  have  been  re-dressed  with 
considerable  thoroughness  by  our  Roman  poet.  It  displays 
to  advantage  the  extraordinary  importance  which  the 
Romans  attached  to  the  unknown  and  uncontrollable 
powers  whom  they  considered  masters  of  their  fate,  and 
their  incessant  anxiety  to  avoid  offending,  by  word  or  deed, 
the  capricious  something  which  might  work  so  much  harm. 
Livyi  says  that  it  was  Numa  who  implanted  in  his  people 
this  scrupulous  reverence  for  portents  and  omens.  If  this 
be  so,  Numa  did  his  work  well.  Even  Livy  himseK  was  not 
immune  from  some  misgivings  on  the  subject,  and  it  may  be 
guessed  what  enormous  strength  this  superstition  possessed 
two  hmidred  years  earher  when  Plautus  wrote  for  the  people 
of  Rome.  The  feeling  is  scattered  broadcast  through  his 
plays.  It  appears  in  the  common  propitiatory  ejaculations 
of  the  people,  qiuie  res  bene  uortat  {Cajyt.  361),  quod  di  bene 
nortant  (Aul.  175),  bene  dicite  (Asin.  745),  in  the  angry  fear 
aroused  in  one  person  by  a  careless  ill  omen  on  the  part  of 
another  {Amph.  722),  in  the  advantage  attached  to  a  crow 
engaged  in  converse  on  one's  left  {Aul.  624),  and  in  many 
other  instances  (e.g.  Rud.  336,  Bacch.  1141,  Most.  464). 
Auspices,  too,  the  more  official  side  of  the  same  matter,  are 
prominent  in  Plautus.  Thus  Alcmetia  supposes  that  un- 
favourable auspices  have  prevented  Amphitruo  from  joining 
his  legions,  and  in  her  irritated  and  suspicious  mood  she 
seems  to  regard  the  matter  exactly  as  the  cold  and  comph- 

1  I,  19. 


n]  KELIGION  67 

cated  science  which  was  beginning  to  rule  tlie  world  of 
Roman  politics.  In  Capt.  766  Aristophontes,  moved  to 
slang,  holds  auspices  responsible  for  his  exit  from  and  return 
to  captivity.  Other  and  minor  references  to  the  Roman  habit 
of  divination  are  Amph.  1132,  Asin.  263,  374,  Epid.  183, 
Pers.  607,  Ps.  762.  It  is  probable  that  no  Greek  writer  would 
have  emphasised  this  matter  in  the  way  that  Plautus  does. 

The  last  word  on  this  subject  concerns  philosophy.  In 
general,  Plautine  characters  repudiate  any  bent  in  that 
direction,  e.g.  Psetidolus  (1.  687)  ium  satis  est  philosophatum, 
and  Acanthio  {Merc.  147)  philosophari  numquam  didici  neque 
scio.  Mention  must,  however,  be  made  of  Tyndarus  (Captiui) 
who  takes  a  more  serious  view  of  Ufe  than  the  ordinary 
Greek  slave,  a  fact  not  to  be  accounted  for  solely  by  his 
superior  origin.     His  speech  beginning  (1.  741), 

post  mortem  in  morte  nihil  est  quod  metuam  mali, 
is  a  piece  of  Lucretianism  appearing  long  before  its  time. 
Plautus,  in  reading  many  plays  of  the  New  Comedy,  must 
have  become  familiar  with  the  philosophies  which  succeeded 
the  fall  of  the  Olympian  hierarchy  in  Greece  and  found  their 
way  at  a  later  period  to  Rome.  Thus  Tyndarus  ejaculates 
ill  the  name  of  Juppiter  and  Hercules,  but  at  the  base  of  his 
Credo  hes  the  old  Epicurean  tetractys — 

a(f)o^ov  6  Oeo'^, 

avaicr6r}Tov  6  Odvaro'^. 

TO  dyadov  evfcrrjrov, 

TO    BeCPOV    €V6fCKapr6p7]T0V. 

The  reference  to  the  Cynics  in  the  middle  of  the  revelry 
which  ends  the  Stichus  (1.  704)  is  entirely  comic,  but  the 
force  of  it  w^ould  appeal  to  a  Greek  rather  than  to  .a  Roman 
audience. 

5—2 


68  the  original  element  [ch. 

7.    Money,  etc. 

Monies  is  your  suit. 

Shahespmre. 

The  common  statement  that  Plautine  characters  deal 
exclusively  in  Greek  money  does  not  obviate  the  propriety 
of  enquiring  a  little  further  into  this  matter.  It  is  true  that 
Greek  coinage — drachmas,  minas,  talents,  and  PhiHppics — 
predominates  in  all  the  plays ;  but  there  is  at  least  one  sum 
of  money,  the  nummi  sescenti  referred  to  several  times  in 
the  Persa,  which  is  quite  undoubtedly  meant  to  be  taken 
in  Roman  terms.  Otherwise  the  word  nummus,  used  fre- 
quently in  the  plays,  seems  to  mean  just  "coin,"  though  we 
have  the  authority  of  Lewis  and  Short  for  regarding  it  as  a 
definite  sum  in  Men.  219.  The  trinummus,  which  is  the 
title  of  a  play,  appears  in  that  play  as  the  coin  given  to  the 
sycophant  as  a  reward  for  his  services.  It  sounds  Roman 
enough,  but  seems  to  be  without  parallel.  (The  Greek  title 
to  the  original  play — Srjaavpo^: — offers  no  equivalent.) 

The  as  appears  once  in  a  pun,  and  the  terruncius  (the 
quarter  as)  in  the  colloquial  phrase  non  terrunci  facere,  "  not 
to  care  a  button,"  appears  Capt.  477.  The  libella  (strictly 
the  same  as  an  as)  is  similarly  used  Capt.  947,  Ps.  629. 

Roman  weights  and  measures  may  be  conveniently  con- 
sidered under  this  heading. 

The  following  instances  occur: 

libra,  the  Roman  pound  of  twelve  ounces,  Ps.  816. 

quadrilibris    [aula],    a    jar    weighing    four 
pounds,  Aul.  809. 

centump)ondium,,  a  weight  of  a  hundred  pounds  (recognised 
as  Roman  on  the  authority  of  Cato),  Asin.  303. 


U]  UNCLASSIFIED   EXAMPLES  69 

a7nphom  (M.  G.  824),  about  six  gallons,  and  thus  equi- 
valent to  the  quadmntal  of  Cure.  110.  Liquid 

congius,  about  six  pints,  in  the  phrase  con- 
gialis  fidelia  of  Aid.  622. 

hemim.,  half  a  pint  (used  also  by  Cato),  M.  G.  831.     (The 
Greek  metreta,  or  nine  gallons,  occurs  Merc.  75.) 

modius,  a  peck,  a  Roman  corn  measure,  St.  253,  Capt.  916. 
The  Greek  medimnus,  which  was  equivalent  to  Dry 

six  modii,  occurs  quite  frequently  in  Plautus. 

pes,  a  foot,  as  a  measure  of  length,  Asin.  ^^^^ 

603,  Bacch.  550,  Trin.  903,  Cure.  441.  Measure. 


8.    Unclassified  examples 

Many  ventures  make  a  full  freight. 


Proverb. 


The  following  points  cannot  be  classified  under  any  of 
the  above  headings,  but  are  worthy  of  notice. 

In  the  fourth  act  of  the  Trinummus,  the  sycophant, 
having  forgotten  the  name  of  Charmides,  the  man  he  professes 
to  come  from,  tries  to  recall  it  with  the  help  of  the  unrecog- 
nised Charmides  himself.  He  assists  with  the  prehminary 
fact  that  the  name  begins  with  C,  and  Charmides  makes  the 
following  suggestions:  Callias,  Callippus,  Callidemides, 
Callinicus,  Calliimrchus,  Chares,  Charmides.  Now  in  Greek 
the  last  two  begin  with  x>  and  the  rest  with  k  ;  only  in  Latin 
have  they  all  a  common  initial,  and  this  disposes  us  to  beheve 
that  the  passage  at  least  in  part  is  Plautine,  not  Greek,  in 

origin. 

In  Ps.  1302,  Simo  gives  an  estimate  of  the  amount  of 
wine  Pseudolus  can  drink  in  an  hour,  and  the  slave  retorts. 


70  THE   ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

"Nay,  in  a  winter's  hour"  {hiberna  hora).  This  was  accord- 
ing to  Roman  reckoning,  by  which  the  short  days  of  winter 
were  divided  into  the  same  number  of  hours  as  the  long  days 
of  summer,  so  that  winter  hours  were  of  shorter  duration. 

In  Amph.  275,  there  is  a  small  matter  of  astronomy. 
The  constellations  usually  known  by  their  Greek  names, 
Orion,  Hesperus,  and  the  Pleiades,  are  called  by  their 
thoroughly  Roman  titles  lugulae,  Uesj^erugo,  and  TJergiliae, 
which  are  recognised  by  Festus,  though  they  do  not  seem  to 
have  been  adopted  into  Hterary  Latin. 


9.    Language 

Language  most  shows  a  man:   speak  that  I  may  see  thee. 

Ben  Jonson. 

Aelius  Stilo,  in  a  famous  epigram,  said  that  if  the  Muses 
spoke  Latin  they  would  choose  to  speak  in  the  language  of 
Plautus.  At  first  this  may  seem  a  little  puzzling,  but  it 
really  shows  admirable  judgment  on  the  part  of  the  ancient 
critic,  for  although  the  ordinary  language  of  Plautus  is 
hardly  consonant  with  our  idea  of  poetry,  yet  it  is  one  of 
the  most  marvellous  hnguistic  monuments  in  the  whole  of 
Latin  literature.  Plautus  was  a  past-master  in  the  art  of 
words,  a  born  creator,  matchless  and  inexhaustible.  His 
wonderful  imagination  and  his  infinitely  quick  and  delicate 
sensibilities  worked  a  kind  of  magic  with  the  ordinary 
language  of  the  day.  As  he  is  the  sole  extant  representative 
of  his  type  (for  Terence  seems  cold  and  ordinary  beside  him), 
we  cannot  say  whether  he  stood  alone  in  this  respect  among 
his  countrymen,  or  whether  he  typifies  a  people,  unlettered 
indeed,  but  gifted  with  the  rarest  versatility  and  picturesque- 


Il]  LANGUAGE  71 

ness  of  expression.  At  any  rate,  this  aspect  of  his  work 
must  needs  be  considered  in  estimating  his  originality.  Its 
treatment  here  is  necessarily  very  inadequate ;  we  can  only 
try  to  give  the  broadest  idea  of  his  unique  genius.  His 
pearls  of  expression  defy  criticism  as  they  do  apt  translation. 
We  can  do  httle  more  than  quote — and  marvel. 

To  Plautus  the  world  was  not  divided  into  labelled  and 
pigeon-holed  sections.  By  him,  thoughts  of  the  wildest  oppo- 
sites  could  be  welded  together  in  glorious  confusion,  and 
hence  comes  his  infinite  power  of  metaphor.  Examples  are : 
calceatis  dentibus  (with  boots  on  one's  teeth,  Cajjt.  187), 
uetiistate  uinum  edentulum  (wine  toothless  with  3i,ge,Poen.  700), 
odos  demissis  pedihus  in  caelum  iiolat  (the  savour  flies  to 
heaven  with  down-hanging  feet,  Ps.  841),  idmea  uirgidemia 
(a  crop  of  elm-cudgels.  Rid.  636),  monumentis  hiibulis  (with 
reminders  of  bull's  hide.  Stick.  63),  oculatae  w/inus  (hands 
that  have  eyes,  Asin.  202).  All  his  metaphors  are  taken 
quite  hghtly  from  the  ordinary  things  of  life  around  him, 
and  there  is  something  in  them  of  the  whimsicahty  of  Edward 
Lear. 

He  comes  nearest  to  poetry  in  the  Rudens,  where  his 
language  is  inseparable  from  the  romantic  atmosphere  of 
the  whole  story.  It  is  particularly  Gripm,  the  strange  old 
man  from  "the  fishy  briny  places,"  whom  he  endows  with 
a  picturesqueness  of  expression  beyond  almost  any  other  of 
his  characters. 

He  can  invent  magnificent  words  to  fit  any  meaning — 
dentifrangibida,  a  tooth-breaker  (Baccli.  596),  ueriiterhiuni, 
truehood  {Capt.  568).  He  works  miracles  of  fun  with  super- 
latives— occissumus,  ever  so  dead  (Cas.  694),  jxdruissvne  ! 
my  super-uncle!    (Poen.  1197),  ipsissumus,  myselfseK  (Trin. 


72  THE   ORIGINAL   ELEMENT  [CH. 

988).  He  can  conjugate  anything,  be  it  verb  or  not — char- 
midatus  es,  you've  been  Charmidised — rursum  te  decharmida, 
now  un-Charmidise  yourself  again  (Trin.  977).  Equally 
wonderful  is  he  as  a  wizard  in  diminutives ;  even  Catullus, 
with  his  ingenuity  fired  by  tenderness  and  passion,  and  his 
intellect  aided  by  the  additional  hundred  years  of  hterary 
activity  behind  him,  failed  to  outdo  him  here.  Examples 
are  countless.  The  hne  {Ps.  68)  papillarum  Jwrridularum 
oppressiuncidae  is  typical,  and  so  is  the  Lilliput  of  natural 
history  in  Asm.  666,  passerculmn,  agnellum,  etc. 

Plautus  displays  no  less  facihty  in  the  matter  of  puns. 
There  is  one  pun  in  the  extant  fragments  of  Menander,  but 
anyone  who  has  approached  the  unprofitable  pastime  of 
translating  Plautine  puns  into  English,  will  be  ready  to  beheve 
that  Plautus,  brimming  over  as  he  was  with  witty  sparkles, 
invented  his  own  puns,  which  is  much  quicker  and  easier, 
at  his  own  pleasure,  instead  of  trying  to  immortalise  the 
dreary  witticisms  of  an  earlier  age.  His  puns,  good,  bad, 
and  indifferent,  are  simply  beyond  counting.  Of  all  the  plays, 
perhaps  the  Bacchides  is  the  most  afflicted  in  this  respect, 
but  none  is  entirely  free  from  it.  Some  puns  are  on  proper 
names — Sosia  and  socius  (Amph.  383),  dafnnum  in  Epidamno 
("less  at  Leicester,"  Men.  264),  Persa  me  pessuni  dedit  ("the 
Injun  has  injured  me,"  Pef5.740) ;  some  are  merely  common — 
arcam  and  arcem  (Bacch.  943),  palla  pallorem  incutit  {Men. 
610),  inuitus  and  inuitat  {Trin.  27) ;  some  are  plays  on  single 
words — inuocatusin  the  senses  of  '*  uninvited  "  and  "  invoked" 
{Capl.  70) ;  and  himc  ad  te  diripiundmn  adducimus  {Poen. 
646),  we  bring  him,  either  to  tear  you  to  pieces,  or  to  you  to 
tear  to  pieces,  in  Latin  a  delicate  ambiguity  of  which  the 
English  is  incapable. 


Il]  LANGUAGE  73 

In  this  connection  must  be  considered  the  Carthaginian 
passage  in  the  Poenulus.  It  has  always  been  a  crux,  and 
is  Ukely  always  to  remain  so.  The  innumerable  interpreta- 
tions of  it,  all  contradictory  and  subversive  of  one  another, 
by  long  generations  of  scholars,  fill  us  with  the  sanguine 
suspicion  that  once  it  really  had  a  specific  meaning.  Beyond 
this,  we  can  but  echo  the  indisputable  statement  of  Boch- 
artus — 171  lis  explicandis  multi  hadenus  frustra  sudarunt. 

Faihng  any  evidence  to  the  contrary,  we  will  assume 
that  at  least  one  of  the  alternative  versions  of  Hanno's 
introductory  speech  (11.  930-939,  or  940-949)  was  written 
by  Plautus.  The  point  that  chiefly  concerns  us  here  is  that 
in  the  following  scene  all  Milphio's  misinterpretations  by 
word-sounds  of  Hanno's  "Carthaginian"  are  done  into 
genuine  Latin,  and  cannot  be  derived,  anyhow  directly, 
from  a  Greek  original.  Thus  Hanno's  effusion  lechla-chan- 
anili-minichoi  conveys  to  his  bewildered  interpreter  only  the 
Latin  words  lingulas,  canales,  nuces;  palumergadetha  be- 
comes pahs  and  mergas.  and  so  on.  All  this,  then,  Plautus 
evolved  from  his  own  brain,  reahsing  that  such  a  hnguistic 
feat  was  sure  of  a  warm  reception.  It  is  almost  comparable 
with  Shakespeare's  scene,  in  which  Henry  V  learns  French 
by  the  most  direct  method,  only  the  Plautine  humour  lacks 
that  dehcate  flavour  of  romance. 

As  if  to  corroborate  our  confidence  in  Plautus'  knowledge 
of  Carthaginian,  there  is  extant  a  fragment  of  one  of  his  lost 
plays,  the  Caecus,  which  contains  a  Carthaginian  word.  This 
unadorned  but  suggestive  treasure  runs  thus,  A  :  Quis  tu 
es  qui  duels  me  ?    B  :  Mu.     A  :  Perii  hercle  !    Afer  est. 

Alhteration,  assonance,  and  asyndeton  in  Plautus  have 
been  so  frequently  brought  before  the  pubUc  notice  that 

5—5 


74  THE   ORIGINAL  ELEMENT  [CH. 

they  need  not  be  treated  here  at  length.  They  abound  in 
every  plaj^  The  passage  Cist.  206  seq.  is  worthy  of  attention 
for  its  excessive  asyndeton,  as  denoting  the  emotions  of  an 
agitated  lover.  The  chief  point  to  notice  is  that  these  features 
are  characteristic  of  Latin  writings  and  entirely  absent  from 
Greek.  It  is  in  fact  impossible  to  feel  that  Plautus'  native 
literary  style  was  in  any  way  influenced  by  the  works  he  was 
translating. 

Connected  with  his  language,  a  great  problem  arises  in 
the  considerable  amount  of  Greek  scattered  through  his 
plays.  Syntactically  and  idiomatically  he  is  not  affected  by 
it,  but  in  his  vocabulary  this  feature  is  remarkable.  Accord- 
ing to  our  received  text,  some  of  it  is  in  Greek  script,  while 
some  has  been  transliterated,  but  this  of  course  is  no  criterion 
of  what  Plautus  himself  wrote.  In  a  few  instances  the  Greek 
runs  to  whole  sentences,  e.g.  Stick.  707,  ?)  Trhr  rj  rpia 
irlv  rj  fiT)  leTTapa,  and  Cas.  728,  Trpdyfiard  fiot  iTape')(^6L<i 
In  the  majority  of  cases,  however,  the  Greek  consists  of 
single  words  which  have  been  naturalised  to  the  extent  of 
having  Latin  inflexions ;  nouns — zamiam  (Aul.  197) ;  pro- 
thymiae  (Stick.  634) ;  verbs, — karpagauit  (Ps.  139,  Aul.  201), 
paratragoedat  {Ps.  707),  malacissandus  (Bacck.  73) ;  and 
adverbs — euge,  eusckeme  kercle  asfitit  et  dulice  et  comoedice 
(M.  G.  213),  hasilice  agito  eleutkeria  {Pers.  29).  Sometimes 
Plautus  taxes  his  hearers'  proficiency  in  Greek  by  making 
Latin  puns  on  Greek  proper  names,  e.g.  Lycus  and  lupus 
(Poen.  776),  Gelasimus  and  ridiculus  (Stick.  174). 

This  hst  is  by  no  means  exhaustive,  and  at  first  sight  it 
is  surprising  that  so  much  Greek  should  be  found  in  plays 
written  primarily  for  an  unlettered  and  untravelled  people, 
and  apparently  very  well  received  by  them.     It  is  eafe  to 


Il]  LANGUAGE  75 

assume  that  the  audiences  would  never  have  approved  plays 
which  they  considered  stilted  or  spoilt  by  a  learning  beyond 
their  ken.  Although  communication  between  the  Roman 
and  Greek  worlds  was  by  that  time  in  a  comparatively  early 
stage,  a  considerable  amount  of  Greek  must  already  have 
been  adopted  into  the  Latin  tongue.  It  is  significant  that 
Plautus,  originally  a  rough  countryman  whose  very  name 
was  thorough-going  Umbrian,  should  have  been  such  a 
supreme  master  in  the  miderstanding  of  Greek.  It  is  this 
"dunkle  jVIittelgebiet,"  as  Leo  calls  it,  between  Greek  and 
Roman,  both  in  language  and  in  matter,  which  makes  it  so 
impossible  to  define  exactly  where  the  gift  of  the  New  Comedy 
ends  and  the  originahty  of  Plautus  begins.  In  any  case, 
it  is  quite  unthinkable  that  these  stray  bits  of  Greek  were 
stopgaps  because  Plautus  was  unable  to  think  of  the  Latin 
for  them !  In  these  plays  they  come  chiefly  from  the  Hps 
of  slaves  (e.g.  Stichus  and  Stasimus),  and  probably  at  that 
time  they  were  an  innovation  of  speech  which  had  not 
reached  the  more  exalted  circles  of  society. 

The  names  of  Plautus'  characters  are,  with  the  exception 
of  Hanno,  Greek.  But  his  soldiers  are  not  the  plain  Polemo's 
and  Thraso's  of  the  New  Comedy.  Many  names  Hke 
Pyrgopolinices  and  Antamoenides  carry  us  back  to  the  Old 
Comedy,  where  impressive  compounds  such  as  ALfcaioTroXt^ 
and  ^eiht'mTLhi^  are  frequent.  Plautus'  reversion  to  the 
older  method  was  probably  for  comic  effect,  but  it  is  inter- 
esting to  note  that  his  enterprise  occasionally  went  a  httle 
too  far,  and  led  him  to  make  what  Aristophanes  would  have 
regarded  as  etymologically  false  formations. 


76  conclusion:   ''the  hack's  progress"        [ch. 

CHAPTER  III 

CONCLUSION:   "THE  HACK'S  PROGRESS." 

Our  evidence,  not  exhaustive,  but  at  least  fair  and 
representative,  is  before  us.  To  what  conclusion  does  it 
lead? 

The  first  point  to  notice  is  that  a  considerable  original 
element  in  Plant  us  certainly  exists. 

The  second  point  is  that  it  is  stronger  in  some  plays  than 
in  others. 

The  third  point,  which  requires  a  Httle  elucidation,  is 
that  as  far  as  it  is  possible  to  date  the  plays,  the  original 
element  appears  to  be  stronger  in  the  later  plays,  and  com- 
paratively lacking  in  the  earher.  It  is,  in  fact,  possible  to 
trace,  with  a  reasonable  amount  of  probabihty,  the  develop- 
ment of  Plautus'  methods  as  a  playwright,  and  the  effect 
of  his  gradually  changing  views  upon  his  work. 

He  seems  to  have  begun  to  write  comedies  before  the  end 
of  the  second  Punic  war,  and,  as  we  have  already  seen,  he 
probably  first  produced  plays  which  were  tolerably  hteral— 
and  dull — translations  of  the  original  Greek.  Fairly  probable 
examples  of  these  early  works  are  the  Mercator  and  the 
Cistellaria.  The  latter  is  indeed  more  or  less  dated  by  the 
reference,  at  the  end  of  the  prologue- like  speech  of  Auxilmm, 
to  the  still  unfinished  war  with  Carthage — 

jmrite  laudem  et  lauream^, 
ut  uohis  uicti  Poeni  poenas  suffer  ant. 

1  This  jingle  is  curiously  echoed  more  than  a  century  later  in 
Cicero's  celebrated  patriotic  fragment 

cedant  arma  togae,  concedat  laurea  laudi. 


Ill]         conclusion:   "the  hack's  progress"  77 

The  closing  pun,  and  the  appropriateness  of  the  sentiment 
to  a  definite  period,  make  it  certain  that  this  passage,  even 
if  not  the  whole  speech,  was  an  original  composition  of 
Plautus.  Beyond  this,  the  play  seems  to  owe  httle  to  the 
hand  of  the  Roman  poet,  and  we  have  already  seen  (chap,  ii) 
that  one  or  two  of  its  minor  features  are  essentially  Greek. 

These  two  plays  may  thus  be  taken  as  specimens  of 
Plautus'  'prentice-work.  It  appears,  however,  that  after  a 
few  trials  he  grew  more  enterprising,  and  began  to  impart 
new  hfe  to  his  comedies  by  personal  touches  adapted  to  the 
requirements  and  humours  of  his  pubUc.  To  this  still 
early  and  somewhat  progressive  period  may  be  assigned 
three  plays.  The  Asinariu  is  shghtly  Romanised,  but  has 
no  particularly  interesting  feature  to  redeem  its  general 
sordidness.  The  Mostellaria  is  the  excellent  story  of  an  old 
man  who,  returning  home  after  a  long  absence  abroad,  is 
told  by  his  slave  Tranio  that  his  house  is  haunted,  and  is 
thus  nearly  prevented  from  discovering  that  it  really  conceals 
the  untimely  revels  of  his  son  with  a  merry  company  of 
friends.  Plautus  has  done  full  justice  to  the  many  possi- 
bihties  of  this  theme,  and  the  old  story  hves  again  with 
unabated  \dgour.  It  is  the  military  and  legal  flights  of 
Tranio' s  fancy  that  contain  the  most  noticeably  Roman 
elements.  The  Menaechmi  is  another  good  story  vigorously 
revived.  Something  of  the  effect  produced  by  this  we  can 
guess  for  ourselves,  for  Shakespeare,  in  his  farce  the  Comedy 
of  Errors,  has  taken  this  same  ancient  plot,  and  reproduced 
it  in  an  even  less  completely  revised  setting.  If  the  citizen 
of  Ephesus  would  have  stared,  as  he  undoubtedly  would, 
at  Plautus'  nonchalant  references  to  aediles,  patroni,  and  the 
hke,  he  would  have  been  no  less  surprised  when  introduced 


78  conclusion:  "the  hack's  progress"        [ch. 

by  Shakespeare  to  such  personages  as  Pinch,  the  school- 
master, and  Aemilia,  the  abbess,  and  by  the  attribution  to 
himself  of  such  advanced  sentiments  as,  "  Oh,  for  my  beads, 
I  cross  me  for  a  sinner."  It  may  be  noticed  that  as  far  as 
vividness  of  representation  is  concerned,  Plautus  does  not 
suffer  by  comparison  with  the  great  master  who  at  this  one 
point  joins  hands  with  him  across  a  great  gulf  of  time  and 
thought. 

Just  before  the  turn  of  the  century  may  be  placed  Plautus' 
chief  efforts  at  contaniinatio,  alreadv  discussed.  Part  of  the 
Miles  Gloriosus,  as  we  have  seen,  was  probably  written  earUer, 
but  it  is  such  a  patchwork  that  the  history  of  its  composition 
can  hardly  be  reconstructed  now.  Its  production  in  its 
present  hvely  form  was  probably  later  than  that  of  the 
Poenulus,  which  marks  the  end  of  the  war,  and  earlier  than 
that  of  the  Stichus,  which  is  too  dull  to  invite  any  particular 
date,  from  internal  evidence,  but  is  placed  by  Varro  at  200  B.C. 
The  scenes  of  revelry  belowstairs,  with  which  it  closes,  have 
been  reproduced  by  Plautus  in  Roman  guise,  and  are  marked 
by  a  vivacity  of  which  the  rest  of  the  play  is  hardly  worthy. 

The  following  decade  of  peace  and  of  growing  settlement 
and  comfort  at  Rome,  was  productive  of  a  number  of  good 
plays,  which  demonstrate  an  ever-increasing  power  and 
originahty  on  the  part  of  the  author.  The  Epidicus,  cer- 
tainly, does  not  belong  to  his  best  work;  its  failure  on  the 
stage  may  not  be  due  exclusively  to  the  bad  actor  who  is 
mentioned  in  the  Bacchides  as  having  spoilt  it.  We  have 
alread}^  dated  it  about  the  time  of  the  repeal  of  the  lex  Ojypid 
in  195,  and  critics  have  found  in  the  third  act  of  the  Aulularia 
a  reference  to  the  same  event.  Although  Plautus  was  not 
responsible  for  the  original  conception  of  the  miser  Euclio, 


Ill]         conclusion:   " the  hack's  progress "  79 

this  unforgettable  personage  has  lost  not  a  jot  in  his  appear- 
ance in  Roman  comedy.  Every  detail  of  this  extraordinarily 
harsh  and  morbid  character  is  reproduced  by  Plautus  largely 
in  Roman  colours,  and  \vith  a  truthfulness  which  even  his 
imitator  Moliere  failed  to  surpass.  The  Rudens,  which  pro- 
bably belongs  to  this  period,  we  have  already  seen  to  be  a 
masterpiece  from  the  point  of  view  of  language  and  general 
atmosphere.  To  compare  it  with  Shakespeare's  Tempest  is 
perhaps  hardly  just,  nor  as  illuminating  as  some  critics  have 
thought;  yet  Plautus'  workmanship  is  able  to  bear  even 
this  severe  test.  The  Persa  probably  owes  to  its  original 
creator  an  ordinary  plot  and  dull  execution,  and  to  Plautus 
the  enhvening  gift  of  a  goodly  number  of  puns  and  more 
stirring  scenes  of  Roman  feasting.  The  CurcuUo  has  been 
definitely  dated  193,  by  its  reference  to  the  lex  Sempronia 
and  its  connection  with  the  worship  of  Aesculapius.  Into 
this  play  Plautus  has  introduced  an  unadulterated  Roman 
element  in  the  speech  of  the  chomgus,  w^hich  has  already 
been  noticed  for  its  numerous  allusions  to  the  topography 
of  Rome.  In  details,  too,  he  has  gone  farther  in  the  process 
of  Romanisation  than  in  any  of  the  preceding  plays.  The 
Pseudolus,  the  favourite  of  Plautus  and  of  many  critics, 
belongs  to  the  year  191.  This  too  has  been  seen  to  contain 
a  great  number  of  Roman  details.  It  is  further  remarkable 
for  its  language,  which,  besides  containing  a  certain  number 
of  Greek  words,  especially  in  the  speeches  of  Pseudolus 
himself,  is  marked  by  an  originahty  and  picturesqueness  of 
expression,  especially  in  a  wide  vocabulary  of  endearment 
and  abuse,  which  was  now  reaching  its  full  development  in 
Plautus,  and  becoming  the  hall-mark  of  his  work.  The 
Trinuynmus  is  fairly  Roman  but  not  particularly  striking. 


80     conclusion:  " the  hack's  progress "    [ch. 

From  internal  evidence,  as  we  have  seen,  it  may  be  assigned 
to  a  date  not  earlier  than  190. 

The  Bacchides  is  dated  not  much  later  than  189  by  its 
apparent  reference  to  the  four  triumphs  of  that  year,  and 
in  passing  we  cannot  but  regret  its  excessive  share  of  puns, 
although  an  infalHble  sign  of  Plautus'  originahty  at  work.  To 
this  period  probably  belong  the  Truculentus,  which  is  singularly 
immune  from  Grecisms,  and  contains,  in  patches,  a  consider- 
able Roman  element,  especially  in  the  character  of  Stratophanes 
and  in  the  allusions  to  ItaHan  geography:  and  the  Casina, 
very  strongly  Romanised  in  the  scenes  containing  the  casting 
of  the  lots  and  the  celebration  of  the  marriage,  and  obviously 
written  before  the  prohibition  of  the  Bacchanalia  in  186. 

There  remain  two  plays  of  Plautus,  the  Captiui  and  the 
Amphitruo,  to  which  it  is  impossible  to  assign  a  definite  date. 
It  is,  however,  only  reasonable  to  suppose  that  they  were 
among  his  latest  works.  The  Captiui  is,  from  a  dramatic 
standpoint,  extraordinarily  good;  Lessing,  no  mean  critic, 
went  so  far  as  to  call  it  the  best  play  that  had  ever  been  put 
upon  the  stage.  It  would  indeed  be  no  unworthy  fruit  of 
the  many  years  of  labour  which  Plautus  had  devoted  to  the 
writing  and  producing  of  plays.  Its  original  is  unknown. 
It  is  unhke  most  other  Plautine  comedies  in  its  serious  tone, 
and  it  has  been  suggested  that  the  most  amusing  scenes, 
which  are  those  in  which  the  parasite  Ergasilus  appears, 
were  Plautus'  own  invention.  This  is  plausible,  and,  if 
true,  may  be  accounted  doubly  to  the  credit  of  the  author, 
for  the  play  runs  very  smoothly,  and  the  supposed  original 
passages,  apart  from  their  individual  merits,  are  inserted 
with  the  utmost  skill.  In  almost  every  detail  we  have  seen 
the  play  to  be  compatible  with  genuinely  Roman  ideas,  and 


Ill]         conclusion:   "  the  hack's  progress"  81 

it  abounds  in  vividly  Roman  touches,  such  as  the  many- 
allusions  to  Roman  and  Italian  locaUties. 

The  Anijphitruo  is  a  different  type  of  play,  but  no  less 
vigorous  and  striking.  We  have  already  estimated  its 
originahty  and  its  conformity  in  details  to  contemporary 
habits  and  thoughts  at  Rome.  In  the  scenes  with  Alcmena 
it  contains  some  singular  httle  touches  of  tenderness  and 
pathos ;  and  yet  its  general  effect  is  that  of  a  roaring  farce. 
It  was  no  common  mind  that  could  unite  such  diverse 
features  in  a  single  work  without  producing  the  effect  of 
absurdity  or  disjointedness. 

We  have  now  briefly  reviewed  the  twenty  extant  plays 
of  Plautus.  Considered  as  a  whole,  they  vary  greatly  in 
merit,  just  as  the  best  among  them  vary  in  the  manner  of 
their  charm. 

The  importance  of  Plautus,  as  ehcited  by  this  enquiry, 
is  twofold.  In  the  first  place,  he  is  an  instance  of  hterary 
development,  at  a  time  when  the  possibihty  of  such  a  develop- 
ment had  only  just  been  reached,  and  had  not  yet  been  com- 
prehended or  analysed  in  Roman  thought.  His  progress  is 
the  more  interesting,  as  he  owed  it  chiefly  to  himself,  and  was 
almost  independent  of  previous  tradition  or  contemporary 
study.  It  is  difficult  to  pick  out  a  play  or  a  passage,  and 
say,  "Here  he  was  an  artist,"  because  in  so  many  cases 
there  were  earlier  Greek  artists  behind  him;  but  we  can 
say  that  the  man  who  could  produce,  on  the  one  hand,  the 
Mercator,  and  on  the  other  the  Psevdolus,  the  Captiui,  and 
the  Ani'pliitruo ,  was  endowed  at  the  beginning  with  a  wonder- 
ful adaptability  and  capacity  for  progress,  united  to  a  great 
dramatic  sense  and  power  of  creation.  The  nature  of  his 
work  afforded  practically  no  scope  for  excellence  in  original 


82  CWCLirgi^N:    "  TJtffi  hack's  PROGRESS  "        [CH.  Ill 

dramatic  construction — that  was  already  done  for  him ;  but 
in  the  portrayal  of  the  men  around  him,  and  in  the  power 
of  imparting  fresh,  wide-open  life  and  fun  and  mirth,  he 
surely  developed  a  gift  which  is  the  possession  of  a  few  who 
are  as  precious  as  they  are  infinitely  wise. 

Lastly,  with  a  little  discrimination  we  can  learn  from 
Plautus  a  great  deal  of  the  way  in  which  the  Romans  of 
his  day  thought  and  spoke  and  acted.  This  is  important, 
because,  beyond  the  twenty  extant  plays  of  Plautus,  the 
fragments  of  Ennius,  and  some  scanty  writings  of  Cato,  that 
age  has  bequeathed  to  us  no  hterary  expression  of  itself; 
and  the  fragments  of  Cato,  for  all  their  independence  and 
stamich  ideals,  lack  the  extraordinary  vitaUty,  the  sym- 
pathies, and  the  quick  unerring  humour,  which  make  the 
plays  of  Plautus  so  much  more  personal  and  valuable  a 
record.  His  value,  perhaps  temporary,  as  the  main  source 
of  our  knowledge  of  the  New  Comedy,  has  been  frequently 
laboured,  and  has  rather  led  to  the  obscuring  of  his  individual 
merit.  In  some  respects  he  and  we  are  poles  asunder ;  yet, 
when  we  have  considered  him  in  the  Ught  of  his  own  standards 
and  conditions,  he  remains  a  vivid  figure,  memorable,  and 
perhaps  greater  than  we  can  understand. 


CAMBRIDGE:   PRINTED    BY  J.    B.   PEACE,  M.A.,    AT  THE   UNIVERSITY   PRESS. 


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